


In the Service of Others

by DarkTidings



Series: Homestead Georgia [2]
Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Derogatory Language, Explicit Language, Extremely Dubious Consent, Negan Being Negan (Walking Dead), POV Negan (Walking Dead), Rape/Non-con Elements, Survival
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-17
Updated: 2021-02-14
Packaged: 2021-03-04 04:20:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 16
Words: 53,556
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24777523
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DarkTidings/pseuds/DarkTidings
Summary: Sequel toRepair Broken Men.The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others - Mahatma GandhiAU:  The Allied Communities are stable and well established, with years of peace and growth behind them before refugees begin appearing in Virginia, fleeing a community of self-titled Saviors who are led by a man called Negan.  Taking on a madman isn't a tale about war or strength, but instead one of just how far a person will go to protect others, even at the cost of their own soul.
Relationships: Abraham Ford/Michonne, Beth Greene/Alex (Walking Dead: Terminus), Carl Grimes/Sophia Peletier, Daryl Dixon/Lori Grimes, Eugene Porter/Original Female Character(s), Jesus (Walking Dead)/Original Male Character(s), Merle Dixon/Carol Peletier, Shane Walsh/Original Female Character(s), Tara Chambler/Original Female Character(s)
Series: Homestead Georgia [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1596997
Comments: 176
Kudos: 66





	1. Twins of the Abyss

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I _cannot_ emphasize enough that any chapter with Negan has the potential for triggers for everything Negan stands for. Not the glamorized one admired due to JDM's excellent portrayal, but the violent, dubcon monster he really is. **This is not a redemption story.**
> 
> For newcomers to the series with concerns about the Non-Con/Rape warning flag on the story: Despite Negan's "claim" that rape isn't allowed at the Sanctuary, he is one of the most prolific rapists in the series. Rape by coercion is still rape. There will be no graphic scenes of rape (by coercion or force), but the aftermath of what life would truly be like for Negan's "wives" will be explored. Such chapters/scenes will be appropriately flagged for potential triggers and summarized in end notes for those who need to skip them.
> 
> If you don't see Negan's behavior as a predatory rapist as such, then this will not be a story you'll enjoy.
> 
> Our heroine's relationship with Negan I will label as "dubious consent" because she does make an educated choice in what she is doing to take advantage of his obsession with her, but it is not a choice she would normally make.

** May 2017 **

Negan stops in the narrow corridor for the holding cells, noting the cell he’s aiming for is wide open. He holds a hand up and the men with him halt instantly, long trained that failure to respond to a command at best will result in injury and at worst in death. Both of them have served as quasi-bodyguards for damn near five years now. That’s a record for anyone surviving at his side.

There are no voices coming from the cell, just a gagging sound along with something odd, like boots scuffed on the floor. Hand at his gun, he steps closer, getting a better view of the cell.

The lighting is dim, just what little the cell gains from the harshly lit hallway, but there’s no mistaking that one of his guards is getting his ass strangled to death by the prisoner one of his teams brought in while he was out on his own patrol to the north.

David’s frantic, trying to figure out what’s around his neck, but failing to grasp whatever’s being used to slowly end his checkered, useless life. The man’s bulk obscures the prisoner, giving him just flashes of long hair. The man’s belt is unbuckled and his pants unfastened, worn boxers showing through the opening. His intent for the prisoner is pretty damned obvious.

He ignores his dying flunkie’s obvious terror and pleading hand outreached for him to help. If the asshole’s stupid enough to let a confined prisoner choke his sorry ass to death, he deserves the slow and excruciating death he’s currently experiencing. Blood drips from a busted nose, even as any sign of the man’s vestigial level of intelligence fades.

The prisoner doesn’t give up on the strangulation even as the movement stops, and Negan tilts his head, counting the seconds. When he reaches sixty, the tension holding Dave’s body upright is released, and he finds himself facing a battered woman who holds her body with all the tenseness of a snake ready to strike.

He still can’t see what her weapon actually is. It’s too thin to be a belt, and if he were in some fucking stupid Hollywood spy movie, he would guess it to be a garrote. 

“Seems you’ve rid me of a particularly stupid minion, gorgeous. I think that might deserve a reward.”

She takes a deep breath, making no move to cover the skin exposed by the tattered remains of a colorful button-up blouse. Her bra hangs open, and he’s not sure if it’s as damaged as her shirt or not. From the blooming color of the bruises on her face and ribs, today’s not the first time she’s taken a hell of a beating, but then again, that’s one of the reasons she’s here and not dead by a roadside.

The bruises are semi-obscured by a tapestry of inkwork that turns what he can see of her torso into a veritable Garden of Eden laid out on human skin.

“Don’t want to talk just yet? That’s understandable. Most people rarely want to converse with their jailers.” He steps closer, watching as her eyes narrow. She’s studying him as much as he’s studying her, gaze taking in the gun and knife at his belt. Lucille gets a few seconds longer attention than the first two weapons.

Most intriguing, she doesn’t move backwards in the cell as he comes closer to her personal space. 

“I hear that you killed two of my men before they managed to subdue you. Guess this stupid sack of shit makes three. Saved me some trouble, since rape is very much against the rules here.”

“Your men rely on brute strength and have the intelligence level of a slightly advanced toddler.” 

Her voice is raspy, but then again, she’s been in this hole for over forty hours without food or water. He’d probably sound like shit too.

“They also appear to have lost the ability to properly tie a rope,” he says, seeing the length that should be securing her wrists pooled near the back wall. It would have been his first guess for her weapon, but instead, he really _is_ in a fucking spy movie.

Held in her hands is a fucking wire garrote. Now, he knows David’s too goddamned stupid to ever bother with a weapon of finesse, so he wonders which incompetent asshole he needs to introduce to Lucille for being too much of a moron to properly search a prisoner.

“Maybe you should recruit more boy scouts, fewer baboons.”

“Ain’t no such thing as a boy scout left living in this world, sweetheart.” Negan raises Lucille and uses the tip of the bat to nudge aside her shirt on the left side. It’s a mass of colorful bruises. He figures one of his men kicked her once she was down the day she was captured. “Ribs broken?”

“Cracked, maybe.”

He’s a little surprised at what he thinks is an honest answer. She controls the flinch superbly when he presses Lucille against the worst of the bruising, her eyes narrowing again.

“My men don’t bring new recruits back often these days.”

Although to be entirely honest, the only women brought back recently have been attempts at bribing him to add to his harem. He’s gotten bored with a wife in the past and returned her to the general population, after all. The idiots haven’t figured it out yet that he’s fucking bored out of his mind with _all_ of the biddable little bitches. At least the rejects give more warm bodies to the labor pool, even if it doesn’t keep his attention from straying to their wives and girlfriends.

Keeps them on their toes to think their ladies might have to save their asses from his wrath.

“If this is how you manage recruiting, I can understand the scarcity.”

He’s still holding Lucille against her bare skin, and she still hasn’t loosened her grip on the garrote. He actually wonders if she could manage to take a blow from the bat and still get the weapon around his neck. The idea of it is the first real arousal he’s felt in months.

But her words make him laugh and he drops the bat back to rest against his boot. “You might have a point there.”

Her only response is an arched brow and an expression that clearly conveys ‘no shit, Sherlock’ more clearly than if she said the words.

“Your people are dead.”

“I know.” It’s the first emotion she’s displayed, a flicker of grief that warns him that capturing her is probably going to rest among Derek’s nightmares one day, if Negan lets her live.

“I’m going to correctly assess that there’s not a damn thing we can do for you to tell me where your community is.” Most people have a breaking point. He’s not yet ready to give up this interesting puzzle to find out where hers is. He suspects he might have to kill her before she’ll break.

Call it a sense of kinship, of sensing a similar potential for the untapped, darkened abyss standing before him in feminine form.

“That would show more common sense than this bastard had.”

David begins to stir at their feet, unlife making him groan about as intelligently as life did. She looks away for the first time, staring dispassionately at the man reviving into a cannibal at her feet. 

Negan wonders what she would do if he simply stepped backward and shut the door to the cell.

Somehow, he thinks he would open that door again to find David’s brains painting the floor and walls and a woman even more willing to feed him his own balls than she is right now.

He grins, sliding the big buck knife from its sheath and flipping it to offer her the handle. “Care to finish what you started?”

It’s a gamble that she won’t use the knife on him, but she’s fucking smart. She’s got to know there’s no way she makes it out of a goddamned prison after killing him.

His devil be damned luck holds, once again, because she buries the knife in one of the dead man’s bulging eyes and leaves it there, stepping back to the same position she was in before. The garotte dangles now, held only in the hand that didn’t handle the knife.

“Maybe we need to up our recruiting game. Show you not everyone at the Sanctuary is too stupid to live.” He reaches out to run two fingers along her jawline, where swelling indicates she took a hell of a punch the day she was captured. He’s still surprised that Derek admits that it didn’t put her down and she killed the man who hit her.

“Why would I care?”

“Well, sweetheart,” he drawls, gripping her chin lightly. “Right now, you’re all on your lonesome, and even if you escaped here, you’d just lead us back to whatever little pissant community you’re protecting. Doesn’t matter to me much if I take it voluntarily or if I have to apply just the right amount of pressure to get a new dirt-scrabbling village to accept the protection that Sanctuary offers.”

Moving down into the warmer climate offered by the Southern states is one of the better ideas Negan's had. Besides, the communities north of Virginia proved too weak to support his people.

“What does voluntarily mean for my people?”

At least she admits the little group of twelve they found on the road isn’t all her people in the world. The group was too clean and too well fed to be nomads. The vehicles were all converted to the same sort of biodiesel Sanctuary runs. You can’t miss the stench of vegetable oil based fuel.

That kind of fuel means crops, or at least contact with a community that grows crops, and that is certainly a resource Sanctuary needs more of.

“A partnership, gorgeous. We provide protection from unsavory bandit groups and clear the dead from the area on our regular patrols. In return, the little rabbits that hide in their dens share half their supplies with us.” He strokes his thumb along her bruised cheek.

“Like serfs.”

“Serfs. I like that term. Strikes me as very feudal overlord. Most of those new to my way of thinking say slaves, but I won’t own your people. They’ll be quite free to continue on their pathetic little lives all they wish to.”

“So long as they turn over the proper tithes for your protection.”

“Precisely.” He drops his hand away from her face, watching as she considers his words.

There’s a split second where he thinks she’s considering taking her chances. But then she sweeps her gaze over him, head to toe. The two men in the hallway get the same treatment.

“Prove it.”

“Prove what, sweetheart?”

“Prove you’ve got the qualifications to protect my people. Then maybe we can talk.”

Negan laughs, a full on belly laugh like he hasn’t managed in ages. “I do like your spirit. Proof? That I can provide. Why don’t you sort out your blouse, if you can. No sense teasing the men with what they aren’t allowed to touch.”

He knows exactly what those words will mean to the two men in the hall. By nightfall, there won’t be a man, woman, or child who will risk even breathing funny in her direction. Not as long as she holds his interest.

The mystery of how his men missed the garrote is solved when she flips the wire around her torso and embeds it back into the base of her bra like a goddamned underwire, using the loops to fasten the undergarment back together.

“Holy shit, if that ain’t the most ingenious bit of womanly weaponry I ever fucking seen.” He’s glad he didn’t take it now.

Her blouse is a complete loss, most of the buttons missing, so she just ties the shirttails together. It results in a Daisy Duke style cover up of her bra that is almost as intriguing as bare skin. She surprises him by reaching down to tug his knife out of David’s useless brain, methodically wiping the blade on his shirt.

She flips the knife to offer him the handle, a ghost of a smile on her features. There’s nothing really welcoming in it, yet that lingering sense of danger he’s feeling in her presence sizzles down his spine like lightning.

Fuck him running, but he wants this woman so bad he can feel it in his damned _bones_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> While RBM is not complete, yet, this is a trailer of sorts as an introduction to ISO. When I finish RBM and start posting chapters for ISO, the ones that follow will be brighter, sunnier.... checking in with what's happened in the five years between the two stories. My current estimate is that ISO will begin posting in mid-July 2020.
> 
> I will not confirm the identity of Negan's captive publicly. If you really, really need to speculate and want a potential spoiler, please feel free to email me: darkertidings @ gmail .com.
> 
> Rating will likely jump to E, because not every scene will be in Savior territory.


	2. Calm Before the Storm, Part 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Merle acts as breakfast cook for the children while Carol is away, Jacqui misses her oldest daughter, Hershel reflects on being a grandfather, and Paul tackles putting clothes on a miniature whirlwind.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you haven't read Chapter 119 of RBM, you probably should. I will be alternating the final chapters of RBM with a counterpart chapter that reintroduces the POV in ISO. All of the "Calm Before the Storm" chapters should be considered prequels to Chapter One and Negan's capture of our heroine.

**May 24, 2017**

> \- < Merle > \- <

At fifty-three, Merle realizes what most men who build or purchase large homes realize: they’re too damned big once most of your children are grown.

The sense of an increasingly empty nest was offset for a while by hosting other families close, but that frittered away much the same as the house gradually emptied of Merle’s own older children. Hershel left to live with Lenore on the Eldridge farm. Beth stayed for a year longer, at least as her official residence, but as soon as her veterinary training ended, she married her young man and took over a house on Tybee to serve as the veterinarian for the coast.

He honestly thought Patricia might permanently live with him and Carol, but as her fosterlings reached sixteen and left for apprenticeships one by one, she surprised most of Homestead by starting to date again. She married Morgan Jones six months later and moved down to the Expansion with little Matty and her new husband, overseeing the cafe style community kitchens originally set up for the Woodbury refugees.

As Carol predicted, Jazz never moved back to Georgia, choosing to serve as the veterinarian at large for the Virginia communities. Surprising exactly no one, Honey lasted less than six months in Georgia after her brother moved north. Sophia and Logan both took their apprenticeships at Hilltop, and whether Logan will return to Homestead when his ends next year is anyone’s guess. Sophia didn’t make it quite back to Homestead, not with her other half working as the engineer for the Georgia end of the train line to Virginia. Even Jamie relocated, although he, Amy, and the kids only went as far as joining Andrea and Dale at Tybee.

In a five bedroom house, only two are occupied, because his two youngest children insist on sharing a room still. Cricket declares it a Dixon trait, to be overly attached to one’s siblings. He just wishes she didn’t sound so wistful when she says it.

“Daddy?”

Merle smiles at the interruption to his almost morose thoughts. “Yeah, baby girl?”

“You’re gonna burn the bacon, and Nate hates his crispy.”

Ava’s right, so he rescues breakfast, getting the bacon off the heat and onto the drip racks. “You in the mood for scrambled or fried today?”

She looks at Nathaniel, strapped safely in his booster seat at the table. His youngest son is coloring, paying no attention to their conversation. “Scrambled. Can you add cheese and jalapenos?”

“Sure. Want to help?”

Ava grins, finding her step stool and unfolding it in front of the stove. He cracks the eggs into the pan for her, wanting to skip the frustration that will inevitably erupt if she accidentally lands shell in her pan. She looks so much like Carol it’s damned adorable, especially when she concentrates as she wields the spatula while he retrieves the jar of diced jalapenos from the refrigerator. 

“How many spoons?”

She observes intently until he’s added four fairly heaping spoonfuls to the six eggs in the pan. “Now, Daddy.” Her red pigtails bob as she nods to emphasize her words.

“It’s a good thing you kids have cast iron stomachs like your old man,” he says, putting the lid back on the jar and returning it to the fridge.

“Mama doesn’t like the hot food so much.”

“Very true, sweetheart, which is why we spoil ourselves when she’s off on a trip.”

Ava’s quiet, watching the eggs slowly morph from liquid to solid as she stirs slowly. “How much longer is she gonna be gone?”

“Remember what I told you last night? When we read her email?” At five, Ava already shows an intelligence level he suspects her teachers are going to scramble to keep up with until she’s old enough to formulate her own education.

“Yeah. The train runs on other Saturdays.”

“Every other Saturday, yes. So your mama will be home this Saturday, along with Michonne and Cricket and the kids.” Ava was actually supposed to go on the two week long trip to Virginia with Carol and Michonne, but a difficult to conquer ear infection kept her home. Only the promise that they would go up to see her northern-based siblings and nephew in Virginia in early July kept her from a full-scale Dixon tantrum.

It’s one thing that amuses him. Ava looks like Carol, but inherited Merle’s personality on a level that’s amusing when her temper isn’t ignited. Nathaniel’s almost three, so it could change, but so far, he’s a miniature Carol in attitude, down to being able to coax Ava out of any doldrums by force of hugging the stuffing out of her. The older he gets, the more he looks like the few childhood pictures Merle has of himself.

He shreds cheese into the pan when the eggs are nearly done, making them nearly as much cheese as eggs, like both kids love. “We need to get to eating. You’re due at school in half an hour.”

“Mister Rick says we are going on a scavenger hunt today.” Ava gives the eggs one last shove around the pan as he cuts the heat.

“Well, that ought to be a lot of fun.” The former deputy deciding to drop back to teaching surprised a lot of people, except his ex-wife and childhood best friend. Merle thinks Rick definitely missed his calling when he became a deputy instead of a teacher after college, because he’s damn near worshipped by his gaggle of beginner students.

Ava nods. “Me and Meredith are gonna be partners.”

“What about Callie and Judith?”

His daughter sighs and actually rolls her pretty little blue eyes at him. “You know that Callie’s best friend is Matty, and Judith will _always_ ask Hershey to be her partner. She _cried_ yesterday when Mister Rick asked her to sit with Nico for reading time instead of Hershey.”

Merle hides his amusement as he fills plates and cups and sits them in front of both kids. He has to gently coax the coloring book and crayons away from Nathaniel, but Ava’s quiet urging of “there’s peppers in the eggs” makes it easier. While Carol once predicted a trio of Dixon girls with Callie being the miniature warleader of the male contingent of their birth year, it didn’t quite play out like that. These kids have very firm ideas on who their best friends are.

He certainly doesn’t object to Ava’s best buddy being her weeks-older niece.

Maybe the house is too big for just the four of them left in residence, but with the steady growth of the family and several members not living at Homestead now, he supposes he’s glad it is. It certainly makes family gatherings easier when everyone descends on Homestead.

He grins and finishes his breakfast before Ava decides to lecture _him_ about the time.

> \- < Jacqui > \- <

Jacqui leans against the doorframe to the bathroom, watching as Jim trims his beard. He catches her over his shoulder and pauses, smiling. His once dark beard is slowly giving way to silver, showing that he’s almost fifty far more than his still dark hair. “Brandy off to terrorize the world already?”

She laughs. “Yeah. She said we were too slow this morning, and she had plans.”

Their younger daughter, at fourteen, doesn’t lack for keeping busy. Unlike Jocelyn, who enjoyed being in the classroom and honestly seemed sad when she graduated out of the regular schoolroom at thirteen, Brandy nearly threw a party when becoming a teenager meant she got to join the ranks of the teens rotating through various job skills to figure out what they wanted to concentrate on when they apprenticed at sixteen.

It’s just Brandy at home now, thanks to that apprenticeship system. Jocelyn’s at Hilltop, learning to be a teacher, to no one’s surprise. None of the teens apprentice at their home, although some are half-trained by the time they do shift to another community. Jacqui was one of the proponents of the plan when it began three years ago, when she took over Scout Walsh’s seat on the Homestead Council. It builds ties between the population that would be harder, without the youthful friendships linking everyone together.

But it doesn’t make her miss her oldest daughter any less, and she knows Jim is practically counting the days and hoping that Joss actually comes back to Homestead instead of teaching elsewhere when her apprenticeship ends next spring.

“Think you could take some time off from the garage?” she asks, thinking about the security schedule. They don’t run the amount of teams outside the walls they once did, because seven years after the world turned upside down, the well-coordinated teams from the eight Georgia communities have keeping their area clear of dangers down to an art form. 

There have been other communities found since the battle with the Governor of Woodbury, but none of them wanted to stay independent. Absorbing their populations into the existing communities keeps all of their populations thriving rather than just surviving. Hell, the tiny twenty-person Savannah Farm community they discovered in the second year of the apocalypse has enough farmland enclosed now to give Homestead a run for their money on food and livestock production, and a population of nearly a hundred people.

Fewer herds doesn’t mean no patrols at all, but her set of teams is due to roll to their two weeks off duty in two weeks before going back on for six. Two of those will be completely away from Homestead as part of the ongoing push across the Georgia borders into the neighboring states. Most food supplies are long spoiled, even canned goods, by the cycles of hot summers and cold winters, but they’ll always need the manufactured supplies that aren’t easily replicated anymore.

Jim returns to his shaving, thinking over her request. “Yeah, Rosita won’t mind, especially now that Rachel’s more independent and doesn’t hate the daycare so much.”

“Good. I was thinking of asking Lori to take Brandy off the chore rotation and us take the train up to Hilltop when it goes out next.”

While running the steam engine train back and forth between what used to be Gainesville, Georgia and Hilltop is a system that requires a lot of coordination of supplies and fuel, Eugene’s pet project remains one of the best ways to shift larger quantities of food, supplies, and people safely between the two halves of the Allied Communities. It even necessitated the development of a forty-person community in former Gainesville to serve and protect the train while it’s in Georgia, jokingly named King’s Cross when it first started, but the name stuck.

The train spends two weeks near Hilltop and two weeks at King’s Cross, so taking the train means spending a fortnight in the opposite location if you rely solely on it for travel. Car travel is possible, but rarely approved by any community for the fuel consumption, and traveling by wagon, horseback, or bicycle is just not worth the time for most travelers between the two states.

“That sounds like a pretty good plan. Sure you’re not just anxious to get a good look at whether or not she’s dating, mama bear?” He grins, rinsing his razor and then his face. “While Honey might keep a teen romance secret if she had no concerns, you know Jazz would sing like a canary if you seemed worried.”

“Not if it’s Logan.”

“Ah.” Jim leans on the sink with one hip, beckoning her forward into a warm hug. “You know there’s not a single apprentice up at Hilltop that we wouldn’t be absolutely happy for Joss to fall in love with.”

“It’s not the apprentices that bug me.” Well, maybe other than Logan, because the odds of that particular Dixon moving back to Georgia are pretty slim. “What if she decides to follow her heart like Jazz did and stay up there?”

Jacqui knows it’s silly to fret so much about her daughter, an adult by all the communities’ current laws at seventeen, but both girls were already half-grown when she and Jim got them. They didn’t get to spoil them long enough.

“Well, if that does happen, darlin’, then maybe we try out a different community ourselves for a few years once Brandy leaves for an apprenticeship. Nothing says we have to live at Homestead forever.”

He’s right with that. Even her Council seat doesn’t mean she has to always live here. Just as Scout resigned, she could too, and give her seat up for fresh ideas. Mechanics of Jim’s skill are welcomed everywhere, and Rosita’s phenomenally good with anything mechanical, so Homestead wouldn’t be left in the lurch.

“I guess that gives us two years to see where Brandy’s interests finally end up, eh?”

Jim just laughs and kisses her gently. “You and I both know that girl’s a mechanic down to her bones, even if she does wander off for a while to see what else she might like.”

“I love you,” she says against his shoulder, hugging him tight. She knows the worry over the girls comes from losing one brother too young and never knowing the fate of the other after the world ended. Jim lost more, horrifically, so he understands her need not to be permanently far away from their daughters.

“Love you, too. Now, are we going to breakfast or were you eyeing me from the doorway like that for an entirely different reason and announcing the place was childfree?”

Jacqui can certainly take a hint to return to her initial reason for admiring her husband’s still trim form. He takes her slow smile as an answer and leads her toward bed, not breakfast.

> \- < Hershel > \- <

Hershel runs the ultrasound wand across the patient Jersey cow, studying the screen intently. “What do you see, Lindsay?” he asks. 

The girl leans in, squinting, before retrieving her glasses from their protective pouch. “Twins. Ugh. Gonna suck waiting to find out their genders.”

He smiles at her grumpy reply. She’s his last apprentice he’ll train, and he thinks she’s the most likely to stay at Homestead. Titus is a good man with the animals, and no one would ever guess the man started his career in the prison system, but the sheer number of herds here need more than one skilled veterinarian. Perhaps Beth or Jazz will return one day, or even young Logan, but if he were a betting man, his bet would be on Lenore’s youngest. 

“At least we don’t have to turn a profit like the old world cattle or dairy farmers did,” he reminds her. Losing a potential breeding heifer and future milker as a freemartin isn’t a financial issue here. If these calves are a mixed gender set of twins, the female will simply be treated as any surplus male would. A good life of sunshine and plentiful food before going where so many animals before have - the community freezers.

“I will keep my fingers crossed for two heifer calves. We could always use more milk cows. Lori says she’ll teach me how to make cheese the next time she runs a batch.”

“That’ll be a good lesson for sure. You’re working over there on Friday, right?”

With Jazz gone, somehow the dairy operation landed in Lori Dixon’s lap, and she’s taken to the job with an enthusiasm Hershel certainly wouldn’t have predicted when he met the woman back in that quarry outside of Atlanta. The tiny creamery Jazz began with is a project for the schoolchildren, with just enough sheep kept to keep it interesting as an agriculture and science lesson. Lori’s new domain is on the property they still call the Horse Farm after all these years, despite the only horses being ones ridden over by workers for the creamery or herds.

“Yeah. The Savannah farm is delivering a lot of water buffalo milk that she thinks she will split into mozzarella and domiati, so some fresh and some cured.”

“Just don’t try to eat half your lesson in mozzarella,” he teases. 

She grins, petting the pregnant cow before leading her back to the field to turn her loose with her fellow expecting cows. “That’s all the Jerseys today. Do we want to start on the Swiss?”

“We’ve still got about two hours until supper, so we might as well.”

He smiles as she treks into the field, going to find their next patient. Hearing about the planned delivery from the Savannah farm makes him hopeful. Beth usually tags along with the supply exchanges between Homestead and the Savannah communities, bringing Elijah to spend a day playing with his cousins and her stepbrother Taylor to visit with his mother and one sister remaining at Homestead. She hasn’t seen Maggie’s youngest child yet, with Annika only nine days old, so he’s fairly sure she’ll come.

It’ll be a treat to see two-year-old Elijah, so he thinks he’ll plan to spend the day surrounded by his grandchildren instead of working, since Lindsay’s already scheduled to be working with Lori that day anyway. Hershey won’t mind missing a day of school in favor of a day with Grandpa, even if he has to share the attention between his cousin and two younger siblings.

Being Grandpa is one of the best roles he’s had in his sixty-seven years. 

> \- < Jesus > \- <

Paul chases his completely nude toddler through the cottage, torn between being vexed and amused at his son’s antics. If MJ had his way, he would never wear a stitch of clothing whatsoever. On one hand, his nudist preferences meant potty training was so easy everyone thinks Paul and Jazz are pulling their legs when they say MJ trained himself. On the other hand, he and Jazz get called to convince their little streaker to at least don a pair of shorts by various babysitters on enough occasions to make it a running joke at Hilltop.

“MJ, munchkin, you don’t make your Tåta chase you with clothes like this.”

Well, Tåta is at least a magic word to halt their little speed demon. It also means he goes ass over teakettle across the living room rug for stopping too fast with toddler coordination. “Tåta? Tåta _gone_.”

Paul uses the tumble as a distraction to scoop MJ up and shuck him into the teeny tiny boxers Carol made him to try to tempt him to at least wear one article of clothing. Convincing him to wear clothing is much easier if MJ knows his beloved Nana made the item. “You’re right, buddy. Tåta is making sure all the new baby sheep arrived okay.”

The peak of a lambing cycle rarely changes from Jazz literally sleeping down at the paddocks until the lambs are all safe and sound. Before MJ was born, Paul usually joined him, but the toddler’s too excitable and convinced of his own indestructibility to spend much time at the paddocks when the ewes are wound up and anxious.

“Baby sheep here?”

“I don’t know yet. If you leave your clothes on, you can go play with Amelia so I can go see Tåta and find out if any of the baby sheep need to come live with us a while.” 

It’s a regular enough occurrence for a stray sheep, or goat, or any other baby animal needing round-the-clock attention to come live with them for weeks or months that MJ pretty much expects a new pet anytime he hears the word baby in connection to Jazz. If they ever have another child, he wonders if their son will expect the baby to be returned elsewhere after a period of time.

“Melia!” MJ chants with a grin, thrusting an arm out so Paul can get the little tank top on. 

“Yep. You and Amelia are buddies for the morning with Aunt Olivia.”

Paul doesn’t travel as much as he used to, not overnights, especially. It was part of the deal he made with Jazz before MJ was even conceived. He doesn’t miss being outside the walls like he once thought he would. Maybe the wanderlust would have faded without becoming a father, with just getting older and being married settling him down, but he’s glad it did. They used to travel together, even with baby MJ, for Jazz’s occasional rounds of the Virginia communities as one of only two fully trained vets in Virginia. 

That came to a halt two months ago, when Ezekiel at the Kingdom took in a group of refugees fleeing a well-organized bandit group out of the New York area. The tales of the atrocities the women and few surviving young boys reported has all four Virginia communities keeping travel to a minimum. The trips that do have to be made are accompanied by at least two security teams. They sent the women and children further south, making sure there was an impossible level of geography between them and any pursuit, but so far, they’ve seen no signs of strangers in Virginia.

The promise of spending time with Amelia and Olivia even gets shorts and sandals on MJ. He pats Paul on the head, blue eyes sparkling with mischief under his mop of black curls. “Up, Daddy.”

He swings his son up on his shoulders as requested. Even without Jazz walking beside them, MJ still likes being carried in the way that makes him near eye level with his Tåta when his fathers are walking somewhere together.

MJ and Jazz are the center of his world, and Paul will never give MJ cause to question whether or not he’s the most important part of his life.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> PDFs are uploaded at my site (darktidings. atwebpages. com) for the character lists. I've sorted them a couple of ways, but because they're PDFs, your browser/computer/phone may require downloading rather than viewing online.
> 
> These PDFs do contain a fairly decent amount of spoilers for the opening chapters of ISO, _but_ I figure anyone who wants to peek right away doesn't mind the spoiler potential. They are not a complete listing of the entire population (even I'm not that detail oriented), but a starting point of where the story is outlined to go at this point in time. Consider some information subject to change.
> 
> "Careers" are a bit of a loosely labeled thing in this sequel, but should give you a general idea of what the person does as their primary work as the story opens.


	3. Calm Before the Storm, Part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Four pregnancies among the scattered Dixon and Greene clans expand both families even further between Homestead, King's Cross, and Tybee Island.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you haven't read Chapter 119 or later of RBM, you probably should. I will be alternating the final chapters of RBM with a counterpart chapter that reintroduces the POV in ISO. All of the "Calm Before the Storm" chapters should be considered prequels to Chapter One and Negan's capture of our heroine.

** May 24, 2017 **

> \- < Tara > \- <

Tara picks up the framed print from the end table, studying the black and white prints. Chris sets their youngest daughter down in her play area so she can toddle off to dump buckets of blocks with crowing glee. She drops onto the couch beside Tara, cupping Tara's rounded belly and grinning at the immediate kick.

"Are you still double checking the ultrasound?" Chris is far too amused.

"There is a set of twelve day old twins right down our lane where one twin hid for half the pregnancy."

Chris traces the lines on the second ultrasound, the one done a month ago. "No twin can hide past the anatomy ultrasound, babe. I promise you, there's only one mini-Tara in there."

"He might object to being named Tara."

Her wife just grins. "I'm pretty sure he can claim the name as male if he wants. It's not like there are any other Taras to claim it has to be female."

"Cute, but I'm favoring Casper at the moment."

"Casper Chambler sounds good to me."

"You don't mind him having a different last name than the older kids?" Tara's debated it since she decided their next child would be one she carried. Early in their relationship, she didn’t quite understand the urge Chris had to undergo a pregnancy, but the more she was a partner to the process, the more it intrigued her.

"I have no objection as long as he's happy about it. He may get called Dixon a lot by habit. It happens to the cousins often enough. But that's the thing. There are a lot of Dixons with that as their formal surname. If you want your father's name for one or more of our children, I'm all for it."

"Meghan would be over the moon." With her younger niece and only nephew having T-Dog's surname, only Meghan and Tara are left as Chamblers.

"Then think it over. You've got until September. If it feels right, that's his name." Chris is right there. Tara’s only twenty-four weeks into the pregnancy right now. There’s time to decide.

A solid thud of a wooden block hits the couch next to Chris causing her to get up and scold their errant toddler and plop her little bottom in the corner. Shannon wails pitifully from her timeout seat. "I share, Mama!"

"Throwing toys is not how we share, Shannon. I told you that yesterday and the day before." Chris has the bland tone of a mother long used to toddler logic.

Sniffles continue as Chris comes to sit back on the couch, looking at her watch. "Sure you don't want me to take her to daycare when I go to work?"

Chris has the noon to six infirmary shift, which often turns out to be the busiest one as folks drop by after shifts. Tara's just hit the stage of pregnancy where she doesn't go on patrol outside the walls anymore. It landed her with the six to noon watch shift, but today is an off day.

"I'll be fine, Chrissy. She'll be ready for her post lunch nap by the time you leave anyway, and Christian and Meredith will be home by the time she gets up. You know she's just angry they go to school without her, and daycare won't fix that."

It's Meredith's first year in school, with kids starting whenever between four and six that parents feel they can benefit from classroom versus daycare or home care. At seven, it's Christian's second year, but the classroom setup means the two older children are in the same primary level class.

Chris looks at her watch. "Timeout is over, sweetpea. No more throwing toys."

The toddler makes a beeline straight for the couch, climbing up between her mothers. Her black curls bob around her tiny face. "Mommy look at baby?"

She peers at the set of framed ultrasounds, one a barely recognizable blob taken nine weeks in. The second is the one Tara's been studying, mostly a profile of a cute nose and chin. Shannon isn't quite old enough to truly understand the prints and Tara's growing waistline are related. But she stares at the images with intent blue eyes.

Aside from their eyes, their two girls are unmistakably sisters, with a strong resemblance to Chris down black curls and caramel skin. Meredith's eyes are brown, providing an extra link between Christian and his younger sisters. Tara suspects by the time her oldest is an adult, his adoption will be a remote footnote for his medical files.

Shannon leans down and kisses Tara's belly carefully. "I kiss baby. Can I have cookie?"

The other half of the girls' DNA shows up in their ability to turn on the charm even at a young age, although Chris swears that's as much from proximity to the man as biology. Then again, his coloring isn’t so far off Chris’s that Tara can truly say how much they might resemble him as they age. Meredith’s brown eyes are already one trait from him.

Chris tries to hide her laughter and fails. She lifts the girl, spinning her as she carries her to the table and her high chair. "We're all out of cookies, but there are a lot of strawberries."

"Berries!" Shannon taps her tray repeatedly. She's been on a trend lately where she'll eat anything red without protest, but if anything solid white hits her plate, waterworks ensue. It's not the weirdest toddler habit they've seen raising three kids, but it's sometimes entertaining and easy to solve.

"Hey, share some of those strawberries with me." Tara sets the photo frame aside and goes to help Chris wash and trim the berries.

It takes a few bribes of berries to get Shannon to ignore that her mothers are kissing more than preparing more, but it's worth it for the leisurely kisses Tara enjoys with her wife.

> \- < Sophia > \- <

Sophia signs off duty after turning the watch station over to her replacement. It's lunchtime, and she's starving, so she makes her way back to the house she shares with Carl. Only half of their population at King's Cross is permanent. The other twenty rotate in from the other Georgia communities. The seventh Georgia community is the smallest and newest, existing primarily as the train depot.

Carl's former apprenticeship with Eugene makes him one of only three people who fully understand the steam engine, so it was natural for him to be assigned to King's Cross. No one expected Honey and Eugene to live separately, after all. Sophia's willingness to live here full time elevates her to second in command of the little village, despite still being a year shy of twenty. 

Her boss, Jorge, and his daughter, Brenda, are two immigrants from Turtle Pointe near Savannah. Brenda keeps their vehicles and weaponry in top condition, while Carl covers everything else that needs a tinkerer, from the train to the water system to the power station.

Since their primary purpose is security for the train, they don't maintain a community kitchen and have smaller scale gardens and greenhouses. Most of their supplies are tithes from the other six communities, arriving with each security rotation. The housing is a neighborhood near the tracks that Homestead simply enclosed along with a section of track that allows the train to move through massive gates. The seventeen houses are nearly identical, with odd concrete porches that have steps on either side instead of the front, and all of them two stories. Only the colors and siding differ to make them stand out.

Her home is a rambling white house next door to Jorge’s identical beige one, both at what used to be the dead end of the street near the railroad tracks, but now the first two houses when you approach from their non-residential buildings. The walk is a pleasant enough one despite the day's humidity, and she's more than ready for the air blowing through the house thanks to the strategically located fans. It means Carl's home for lunch before her, and she's glad. 

"Carl?" she calls out, setting her rifle into the gun cabinet in the front closet. She doesn't remove the shoulder holster out of long habit. It took some getting used to the shoulder holster versus her years long habit of a belt holster, but she’s starting to understand why some prefer it.

"In the kitchen." She can smell something tasty and realizes Carl is grilling some of the homemade bratwurst from Homestead.

"How did you know I've been craving those all morning?" she asks, slipping up behind him for a hug as best as her expanded waistline and his task at the stovetop allows.

"Lucky guess." He puts his tongs down and turns in her arms, kissing her gently before rubbing her stomach. "They confirmed the train arriving Saturday."

"Wonder how long Mama will be torn between lingering here versus heading for home and the little ones?" She lets Carl go reluctantly so he doesn't burn their lunch. She retrieves some of the soft bread she baked yesterday afternoon and slices off a couple pieces. "You want mustard or ketchup?"

"Since the baby isn't due until August, I'm going to guess she'll be able to tear herself away this time." He smirks at her, blue eyes bright and merry. He’s barely the same height she is, which she likes, even though he claims he feels like a toddler in a family where even the women trend close to six feet. His long, dark hair is carefully braided still, which means he’s intending to go back to work after lunch. Long, loose hair is a dangerous habit in engineering or mechanics. "Ketchup is good. These are applewood smoked."

"I still maintain that it is weird that you don't commit to a hot dog condiment."

"Putting sauerkraut on anything resembling a hot dog regardless of the content of the sausage is weird, too, you know."

She just grins and sets one of the jars of sauerkraut on the counter. The voracious craving for all things sour was actually her first clue she was pregnant. They aren't married, although it's been discussed that they'll get it sorted one day. The baby wasn't planned, but they're both enamored of their happy accident.

Being in tiny King's Cross worries everyone, but she sees no need to relocate just because she's pregnant. Her checkups work out just fine by Cricket visiting once a month, and Susan is a great nurse who’ll probably qualify as a physician in her own right one day. She'll travel to Homestead nearer her due date, but she doesn't intend on separating Honey and Eugene any longer than it takes the baby to arrive safely and she and Carl to return home. 

She isn't going to mess up their life any more than she has to because her birth control tapped out earlier than predicted. Next time she’s going with the IUD that doesn’t rely on any hormones at all. As happy as she is about her son, she really didn’t intend him to arrive until she was closer to thirty than twenty.

“Be right back.” That’s one of the joys of being twenty-eight weeks pregnant: the bathroom is a place she gets to hang out in at least once an hour, it seems like. She loves their bathrooms in the old house, though. Big bathtubs, nothing as deluxe as her mother’s back at Homestead, but still enough to soak away backaches - or for her boyfriend to join her, back when she wasn’t taking up enough room for two all by herself.

They have their house to themselves, just like Jorge and Brenda have theirs, and Susan and her twin, Robert, share the home across the street from Jorge. It’s the transient security teams that often share the big four bedroom houses. Few people want to be alone in a house with as small as King’s Cross is. 

Sophia washes her hands and returns to the kitchen to find that Carl’s got their lunch moved to the table, with big sides of potato salad he must have made last night after she zonked out on the couch in the middle of watching DVDs of an old television series. The joy of living with Carl is that he’s a better cook than she is. It’s not that she can’t cook. Her mother saw to that, even tackling teaching Scout not to turn out charcoal instead of edible food, but she doesn’t enjoy it.

Even simple meals are best made by someone who likes what they’re doing, she thinks, and she grins as she takes the seat next to Carl. “Do you really have to go straight back to work after lunch?” she asks, taking his hand instead of going for the messy pile of lovely bread, bratwurst, and sauerkraut on her plate.

Carl arches a brow, but she draws her fingers along his palm with a lazy smile. The questioning look changes to an intent one. “I’m sure an hour or two wait won’t hurt.”

Sophia just grins wolfishly, relinquishing his hand so they can both eat, the promise of dessert that isn’t in the kitchen on both of their minds now.

>-< Lori >-<

Lori parks the electric-powered golf cart next to the daycare. As time passes by, their mechanics and engineers tinker more with small transports like this one for those whose duties or family obligations make horses a little more problematic for transport. Lori’s cart isn’t quite as powerful as the larger Polaris vehicles that have been converted to biofuel, but most of the time she doesn’t need it. Any heavy deliveries to and from the creamery on the horse farm are usually handled with the work trucks.

She steps to the fence surrounding the schoolhouse now, watching the kids on the playground playing a game that it takes her a minute to recognize as Red Rover. It’s just the primary school kids in the pretty little fenced area, as the older, elementary aged kids are usually considered old enough to not need adult supervision once they’re done with class for the day at two. It’s a little more freeform in supervising children than Lori would have once been entirely comfortable with, but none of the Homestead children can be considered sheltered. There are no child predators within their walls, either.

Rick is happily directing the game, with kids not wanting to play the game drawing on a large slab of concrete set up generally for peewee basketball. It ends up as an art canvas more often than a sports one, thanks to the tubs of sidewalk chalk the smaller kids delight in. She thinks idly that her ex-husband missed his calling entirely when he went into law enforcement instead of teaching like he originally intended. He needed to serve and protect, yes, but not with a gun and a badge. 

It’s not her own school age daughter who spots her first, but Tyreese and Karen’s son, Tyler. The curly-headed little boy hands his green chalk off to Nico Morales and goes to pat Rick on the hand and point toward where Lori’s leaning near the gate.

Rick flashes her a smile as he thanks the boy before whistling the game to a halt. Judy beams at seeing her mother. She throws her arms first around Hershey Rhee, before also hugging her teacher tightly. She trots over toward her mother, scooping up a blue and gray camo backpack from the pile on the playground. Her neat pigtails are half undone, brown hair fluttering around her head as she flashes her gap-toothed smile. 

“You lost more teeth today?” Lori asked, knowing exactly what the big grin is all about. The daughter she sent to school had both top front teeth.

Judith fishes in her backpack’s pouch, retrieving an envelope made out of construction paper. “One came out at lunch and the other at snack.”

“Well, at least your Daddy won’t have to pull these like the last ones.” 

The two lower teeth made Judith miserable, refusing to fully turn loose and making eating painful. After a consult at the infirmary, it was determined they needed to be pulled, but Judith wouldn’t allow anyone near her mouth but Daryl.

Her daughter giggles. “I think it hurt him to pull them last time.”

Lori agrees. Daryl swore up and down he was never playing dentist again, even though Judith seemed to experience no pain at all when he pulled the tiny milk teeth.

“Give me the packet so we can keep them safe until tonight.” With the realities of the world Judith and her generation grow up in, Homestead maintains the sweet childhood fictions like Santa and the Tooth Fairy faithfully. “Let’s go pick up your sisters, so I can get home to start supper.”

Judith nods, calling out a farewell to her friends and “Mister Rick”, making the man grin at the careful emphasis his niece places on ‘Mister’ while at school versus ‘Uncle’ at home. She follows Lori next door to the pretty little building that serves as Homestead’s daycare.

“Can I go see Tåta and Nåna when we get home?” she asks, as Lori opens the gate. 

“Sure. They’ll probably be happy to have you helping, with Anaya away.”

Thanks to the apprenticeship system, both Anaya and Abby are both far away from Homestead. Her oldest daughter is up north, studying with Eugene and Honey at Hilltop, trying to add to their still negligible number of engineers. It wasn’t a surprising choice, considering Abby’s hero worship of Carl, but the selfish part of Lori wishes Carl were experienced enough to serve as his sister’s mentor. King’s Cross is so much closer.

“Mama!” Getting greeted by Sarah is sometimes a deafening experience, and Lori grins and lifts the four-year-old over the half-gate that keeps the little ones from reaching the front door. “What are you going to do when you get too big for me to carry?” she asks.

The little blonde’s smile fades a little. “When I get big and you get little, I will carry you, Mama,” she declares solemnly. It’s such a mirror of Daryl in tone and mannerism that Lori struggles to hide the smile it causes. 

She hugs the girl tightly and kisses her forehead. “I know you will, sweetheart. Now slide down a minute so I can go find your sister.”

“She’s napping,” Sarah says, but slides down to the floor obediently, going to unhook her pink backpack from the row near the door.

Miranda Morales smiles from where she’s rocking one of the babies. From the wispy black tufts of hair and denim overall shorts, Lori thinks it’s Rick’s youngest daughter. “She’s been down about an hour, so she should be good if you wake her.”

Lori approaches the small crib and smiles at her daughter’s starfished form. Despite all the advice of making babies sleep on their backs, Talia’s always hated it. From the time she could roll herself over, she’s slept sprawled on her stomach. Lori rubs her hand along the eighteen-month-old’s tiny back before doing a quick diaper check. It stirs the toddler to wakefulness.

As always, she looks around when seeing Lori, as if Daryl might be hiding somewhere. Their youngest child is a certifiable daddy’s girl in a way none of the others are. Daryl swears it’s just a stage, but Lori knows he revels in the toddler’s determined affection.

“Daddy’s not here yet,” she says softly, rolling Talia over to change her diaper. She swears the girl rolls her eyes, but she doesn’t protest at least. There was a stage three months ago where she would sob if Lori picked her up instead of Daryl.

With the toddler on her hip waving a languid hand in farewell at her teacher and the two teenage assistants, Lori leads the other girls out to the golf cart. Judith and Sarah are old enough to not really worry about trying to tumble out of the vehicle, but it never fails to amuse Lori that she drives a golf cart with a car seat rigged into the back.

They’re home within minutes, Judith leading her sisters to the cabin as Lori parks the golf cart next to two others that are used by different members of the Dixon Village part of Homestead. She hooks up the charging cable so it’ll be ready for tomorrow and heads inside.

Talia’s happy chatter alerts her that Daryl’s actually home before she is, even before she spots his boots in the tray near the door. There’s very little that resembles clear English in the toddler’s speech, but Daryl’s nodding solemnly like he always does. He sees Lori and sets the girl on her feet, sending her to go find a particular stuffed animal that will keep her busy for at least a few minutes. The other girls are nowhere to be seen, probably sent to put away their school bags.

He greets her with a kiss, making her smile. He’s younger than her by a few years, but in looks, it always seems like even more. She doesn’t think he’s aged much at all since the thirty-year-old she met and disliked at the Atlanta Quarry. His hair is sunbleached to a blond nearly as bright as their younger daughters’, but she knows in winter it will often darken almost as dark as hers and Judith’s.

“Came home and needed that tub of antiseptic cream and found something interesting tucked behind it in the bathroom cabinet,” he says softly.

“Oh.” She smiles, because he sounds happy, not worried, which was her initial concern.

“You’re aiming for as tangled a family tree as Carol, aren’t you?” he teases. “Grandma having a baby younger than her grandbaby and all.”

She can’t help but giggle. It’s not that they weren’t going to try, but getting pregnant the same month she had her IUD removed? That wasn’t exactly expected. Cricket spent a good thirty minutes cautioning Lori that being past forty would make it harder to conceive. Apparently, her uterus and ovaries disagreed.

Daryl does turn a little solemn as he slides a hand against her still very flat stomach. “Maybe the last one though?”

There’s the worry she expected, and she understands. Babies at her age run a higher risk of birth defects and complications to the mother. “Last one,” she promises.

She already has a wealth of children she never expected she would see, before the world got turned upside down. A sixth child is definitely enough to call her family complete.

>-< Beth >-<

Beth steps out onto the back porch of her house, enjoying the cool breeze coming in off the Atlantic. It's past supper time, but the Council meeting ran longer than expected, so she availed herself of the leftovers Alex left in the fridge before coming outside. When she initially decided that traveling back and forth between Homestead and the Savannah area communities wasn’t working for her as a veterinarian, she expected a little bit of fuss from Hershel or Mary at moving so far away. Instead, her father and mother-in-law both understood, and the journey either way isn’t an impossible visit. She knows when she travels up to Homestead with the trade caravan on Friday, they’ll both be waiting at Homestead to steal Elijah away for grandparental spoiling.

She chose Tybee as her home base over the smaller Jekyll Island, larger Turtle Pointe, or the agricultural Savannah Farm because it had more of an immigrant population from Homestead. She might not have been particularly close to Andrea, Amy, or the others, but they were familiar, and Jamie in particular might as well be family, as long as she lived as a sort of adopted Dixon herself.

Considering he delivered Elijah when he arrived three weeks early and faster than Dr. Stevens could arrive back from a planned medical visit to Jekyll Island when summoned by radio, she guesses she knows Jamie better than she ever thought she would.

“You gonna come swim?” Alex calls out. He’s in the water, knee deep, making sure that Elijah stays safely close to shore. Being born near the ocean seems to have convinced their two-year-old that he’s part dolphin, an idea encouraged by the fact that he’s been out in the smaller sailboats regularly since birth to observe the dolphin pods that live near Tybee, along with the migratory pods that pass by each season.

“Planning on it.” She sets up her beach chair and drops the bag with her own towel next to Alex’s chair and bag. His prosthetic was back on the porch, because he claims he never wants to deal with sand in regards to his stump ever again. From the scattered beach toys, Elijah started out with a sand castle project before being lured into the waves. She kicks off her sandals and revels in the feel of warm sand under her bare feet, 

Beth doesn’t go far into the water, sitting down where it’s waist deep and letting Elijah lurk her way, pretending to be either a shark or a dolphin. His hand held up as a fin could go either way. He grins and climbs into her lap for a hug instead of pretending to bite her, so today’s a dolphin day.

Alex wades in to sit beside her, leaning in for a kiss that encourages Elijah to reach up and smoosh them together longer. He’s a little fascinated by kisses at the moment.

“How did your checkup with Jamie go?”

“Bloodwork is all good, and he says he’ll get us on Cricket’s schedule for an ultrasound at Homestead on Friday. Think the kids will survive a day off school here?”

Alex laughs. “One thing that never changes even when the world does, is that small children love to be set free of the classroom to do their own thing. He agrees with Christmas as the due date?”

“Yeah, thereabouts. I know he could do the ultrasound easily, but I figure Daddy and your mama will appreciate being included. I’ll confirm that she’ll be there, but I doubt she’ll let anything distract her from coming to Homestead with Elijah promised to be there.

“She’ll be overjoyed, you know. We may need to plan for a month-long visit.”

Beth knows, because Mary Murray takes being a grandmother as a calling. Officially, she calls Terminus home still, serving as their senior nurse and helping Gareth and Cynthia raise their two children. But since Elijah arrived, she’s spent about a third of the year on Tybee, too. With a fully-trained physician at Terminus, they can spare their most experienced nurse as she takes her “Grandma Vacations”.

“Maybe we should see if Gareth and Cynthia would let the kids come for a visit, too? They’re both old enough to enjoy a month at the beach.”

“Works for me, and Cynthia’s getting into her busy season for crops and livestock anyway. She might appreciate a short break.”

Beth makes a mental note to send a radio-email to her sister-in-law. Cynthia will keep the surprise for her, and she can send her two children along with Mary easily under the guise of visiting Elijah at Homestead.

When Elijah wiggles away to crawl through the sand and water again, Alex gets back to his feet, leaning down for a kiss. “Our little Noel, right? Works for a boy or a girl.”

She just laughs. “Only if he or she arrives exactly on Christmas.”

This is what contentment feels like, she thinks, as she watches her husband play in the surf with their toddler. One day, they’ll probably move away from Tybee, when the population supports another community in Georgia, but for now, she’s happy to be a farm girl who lives by the sea.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter got a little longer than planned, probably because I ended up with three out of four characters that dropped some larger-scale background content. Tara was the only one who cooperated with a sweet little scene of appropriate length. :)
> 
> I did say that most of the babies with a donor/surrogate parent would be made obvious in this story. While I didn't deliberately name Cricket's donor, I'm sure the clues are pretty obvious. (*coughs* Shannon... *coughs*) Tara's clue is either really obvious or not... but her son isn't Meredith and Shannon's biological sibling. ;)
> 
> I also have to go back and correct the Tara/Cricket scene in RBM, because I blathered along with "Cricket" when Tara's POV should not use that nickname for her wife, but the more grownup Chris or occasionally the affectionate Chrissy.
> 
> I know there were a lot of guesses that Sophia or Beth might be Negan's captive, but here's your confirmation that both our blonde badasses are safely far away in Georgia. There's a subtle elimination of another popular guess as well, with something one of the children says in this chapter. ;) Being pregnant and/or family obligations will not keep our ladies from going Amazon warrior style to Virginia, however, once the alarm is raised.
> 
> Please continue to consider the PDFs subject to change... I'll be uploading a small update to add in the King's Cross characters mentioned by Sophia so there's a point of reference as to who they are. I also added a location description for each community on the characters page for the ISO era of time, which also details each community's leadership folks.  
> (http:// darktidings. atwebpages. com/ homestead.html) - remove all spaces.


	4. Calm Before the Storm, Part 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rick picks up his daughters for a father-daughter supper, Denise navigates bedtime in her happily chaotic home, Ezekiel plans for a future that keeps Shiva at his side, and Jazz finds reasons to put off an early bedtime.

** May 24, 2017 **

> \- < Rick > \- <

Rick sends the last of the children off with a parent, doing a walk through of the two room schoolhouse to make sure nothing is out of place that can’t wait until morning. Shifting off of patrol and security to teaching was not an easy decision, because having someone else at Shane’s back was almost an anathema. But in the end, he had to admit that T-Dog might not have the years of youthful friendship to add to the partnership, but the man is a staunch partner for Shane.

He likes the enthusiasm of the youngest school children, when they’re still so excited to be out of the daycare and admiring a desk. It’s an easier contrast to the older children, who are starting to get anxious to be free of formal schooling.

Latching the schoolhouse door and gate behind him, he heads next door to the daycare. Rosita made a run to Terminus today to assist Axel and his grown foster daughter with a generator upgrade, so he’s solo with the girls tonight. Miranda smiles as he enters the playroom she gathers children in toward the end of the workday. It seems he’s the last to pick up today, which is unusual, except that he saw scavenger teams return earlier than usual.

“How was Nico today?” she asks, tucking a few things into Rachel’s diaper bag even as Rick picks up his six-month-old. The baby grins at him, flashing her two tiny bottom teeth.

Her sister’s not paying him any attention yet, but considering she’s helping Miranda’s youngest, Paloma, pick up toys, he isn’t surprised. Victoria has a bit of a one-track mind at the moment, like many three-year-olds.

“He’s still not entirely convinced that he should read for fun, but we’ve got enough non-fiction that might keep him interested. We really need to commission someone to start writing books for children that reflect this world. There’s just so much that reads like a fairy tale to the kids born since the Outbreak that really was non-fiction for us.”

Miranda looks thoughtful. “Have you thought of asking Carl? He always was so good with young children. I suspect he might have inherited that from somewhere.”

Rick laughs softly as he kisses Rachel’s silky fine dark hair when she snuggles close. “He is a good storyteller, and I’m sure Sophia would illustrate anything he came up with. I should probably ask before the baby comes though, because otherwise, it may be a few years before they’re out of new parent fog and creative again.”

“Very true, although I somehow doubt those two will lack for grandparent help when that baby comes.”

“I’m not sure I feel old enough to be a grandfather yet.” Granted, Carl’s young, not yet twenty, but it still feels odd to be thinking of his son as a father-to-be. It seems like Carl was the baby in his arms not that long ago.

“I feel the same way about being a grandmother. Luckily, Eliza doesn’t seem all that interested in the young men down on that island she’s working on yet.” Miranda calls out to the two little girls. “Thank you for being good helpers. It’s time to go home, girls.”

Now Rick is tackle-hugged around the knees by his older daughter. Her black hair is in two very puffy bunches on top of her head still, but he suspects that is only because Miranda or her assistants redid the girl’s cute hairstyle. Victoria is too rough and tumble to let any hairstyle survive an entire day.

“Daddy, I was a good helper!”

“So I see. Do you want to help me with supper at home or eat at the center?” With Rosita not due back until tomorrow, he doesn’t really want to tackle cooking with just him and the girls, but Victoria enjoys helping.

“Can we make grilled cheese?” she asks as Miranda helps her into her little backpack and offers Rick the diaper bag.

“We can. I bet we have some of Aunt Carol’s tomato soup in the pantry, too.”

Victoria dances happily through her goodbyes to Miranda and Paloma, jogging around him as they set down the path toward home.

It isn’t until they’re sitting at the table eating that Rick happens to notice the illustrated calendar near the fridge lists today’s date as May 24th. Seven years ago today, he landed in the coma that nearly took him from his family.

Rick can only be grateful for waking in that desolate hospital room, because he can’t imagine any other life for himself anymore.

> \- < Ezekiel > \- <

Ezekiel finishes reading over the latest search reports from Honey Dixon at Hilltop and comparing them to the reports Dianne’s delivered for their own patrols. They’ve amped up patrols for weeks now, since the refugees came south looking for anywhere safe from pursuit they didn’t know for sure was still coming. The other two communities are capable of self-defence, but neither Alexandria nor Solomons has the depth of training that the soldiers of the Kingdom and Hilltop have.

There was a time, maybe a year ago, where the Hilltop council wanted to roll back their military presence and concentrate more on the small-scale industry they have running thanks to Eugene Porter’s engineering skills and a larger number of craftsmen than any of the other northern allies. It took Gregory’s death after a massive heart attack to remove the primary proponent of that idea from leadership.

In his absence, followed by Paul resigning in favor of his husband taking his seat on the council, Hilltop kept their status as the largest security force north of Homestead. He worries that a test is coming. So many years of peace have allowed the communities to prosper in a way he never would have predicted in the first months after the Outbreak. They’re generations away from the excess of the old world, but they’ve retained enough of the past through reverse engineering efforts that no one’s gone back to pre-Industrial Revolution levels like some of Ezekiel’s own people predicted originally.

“You got a minute, Dad?” 

He turns to see his middle son in the doorway, holding a textbook. Adopting Benjamin and Henry when their mother died seemed almost selfish at the time, three years ago. He already had two children of his own, and there are still those without children in his community. But adding the older boys to the family is the best selfish decision he ever made, leading Gideon and Luna to hero worship in that way much younger children often do for older siblings.

“For you, Henry, of course.”

The twelve-year-old smiles brightly and brings the textbook forward to offer it to his father. “Would it be wasteful to learn boat building so far inland?”

Ezekiel studies the chapter long enough to get an idea of what sort of materials Henry might need. “Well, we aren’t exactly riverside here, but there are plenty that are close enough to test craft out on. Maybe not the Potomac, but the Rappahannock would provide a good testing ground.” 

While they keep the region south of the Potomac relatively clear of the dead now with regular patrols, no one has really tackled the northern side yet. The thought of a boat having to make a landing on the northern bank is the sort of thought that spawns nightmares for parents of adventurous near-teen boys.

“So it isn’t really crazy to learn how to make canoes and small boats when there are still the old fiberglass ones around?”

“I think it is a very useful skill, especially considering that those our communities aren’t using are starting to age in bad ways from weather exposure and improper storage.” Ezekiel hands him the book back. “Fiberglass boats have a finite lifespan, and no one really wants to revive their manufacturing process. I suspect if you perfect your project, you’ll find a lot of interest from the others who have more water to explore.”

At twelve, Henry’s still nominally a schoolchild, but his growing restlessness and need to work with his hands reminds Ezekiel a lot of the Hilltop engineering pair who just have to tinker with everything. 

“Benjamin wasn’t sure, but he told me I should ask.”

“Son, even if all you ever do is build a single canoe to learn how to do it, I would consider it a wonderful use of resources. And you may find that you enjoy woodworking in general, and that is most certainly a craft that our people should encourage. Make a list of the materials and tools you think you need, and we’ll get them gathered up.”

It earns him an enthusiastic hug from the boy. “I’m going to go tell Benjamin.”

Dianne chuckles from where she’s leaning against the doorframe that adjoins his office to their bedroom. She’s in casual wear, freshly showered and her tactical wear put away for the evening. He finds her Amazonian stance even in the soft flow of the cotton mid-thigh sleepshirt to be as attractive now as it was when he took the time to realize the leader of his guardsmen was a beautiful woman as well as a warrior.

“I strongly suspect that little foray was Benjamin being just as interested, but relying on Henry’s cuteness to ensure they received a positive answer,” she says.

“You are quite likely right. I just wish Benjamin didn’t expect not to receive the same familial treatment for his requests.” He sighs, stacking the reports to add to his map tomorrow. “Are the little ones waiting for me?”

“Tucked into their bunks and having a bit of a spat Gideon will swear is a debate over whether to ask for Alice in Wonderland next or another Paddington Bear book.”

“Tell them I will be there in a minute. I want to check on Shiva first.”

Dianne nods, but intercepts him for a kiss, her long fingers cupping his jaw to brush across his skin above his beard. “She is getting old, isn’t she?”

Ezekiel sighs. “She could live as many as twenty to twenty-five years before, in the luxuries the zoo could provide. But now? She isn’t exactly in the wild, but I do not think I can estimate how many years she has left.” 

Shiva has been part of his life since he saved her life in that moat so many years ago. But she’ll be fourteen this year, and her species in the wild rarely lives past fifteen or sixteen. He will continue to hope that the life she has here trends toward those of zoo tigers, because he isn’t ready for old age to take away his oldest friend.

“Go. Settle your first love for the night.” She lets him go with the barest hint of a smile.

Their residence is no longer in the large dormitory building so many lived in during the early days of the Kingdom’s existence. Nowadays, they call the old headmaster’s house home, and what was once a beautifully manicured, excessive backyard is securely fenced just beyond the back patio as the sort of enclosure that zoos could only dream of back when his title was zookeeper and not king.

Shiva’s waiting, as used to the goodnight routine as the children are. She chuffs at the sight of him, rolling to her feet and butting her big head on the bars.

“How are you this evening, my fair lady?” he intones, reveling in the trust the massive predator still places in him.

Ezekiel isn’t sure even twenty-five years will be enough of having her at his side.

> \- < Denise > \- <

Denise watches the girls splash in the tub with a fond expression. While not biologically siblings, there’s nothing in the world that would convince Julianna and Regan that biology matters one single iota. 

Denise’s oldest daughter has the pale, nearly colorless blonde hair that Denise remembers from her own baby pictures, complete with almost invisible eyebrows, but her eyes are the crystalline pale blue of Christopher’s. The four-year-old’s only complaint about looking nothing like her sister is that she gets slathered in sunscreen much heavier than Regan does with her coppery complexion. 

“They about done playing mermaids?” Rachel asks from the doorway, looking amused. 

She’s got Asher asleep on her shoulder, his little blond head still covered more in peach fuzz than actual hair. Christopher joked when he was born that maybe they should have seen if Tim’s genetics would produce a newborn with hair. It made his husband roll his eyes. While Tim is a good father to the three children, the man stated from the beginning of their little family dynamic that he really had no concern in passing on his genetics from a personal standpoint.

“Yeah, probably.” Denise spreads open a towel. “Regan? Want to go see if Daddy’s found your PJs yet?”

The toddler makes a happy screech, trying to stand in the bathtub and offering her arms. “Bear PJs, Mama.”

“Guess you better go make sure he doesn’t confuse the bears with the ones with the baby chickens,” she says, just to watch Regan wiggle impatiently as she’s patted dry. She does hold still long enough to be coaxed into the reusable nighttime underpants some enterprising soul devised for toddlers once the vast supplies of disposable pull ups began to dwindle. Regan does stay long enough for goodnight kisses before she’s off yelling for Daddy and bear pajamas.

Once her sister’s out of the tub, Juli loses all interest in staying and pulls the plug. She’s hit the independent stage of drying herself off, so Denise leaves her to it, instead stepping in close to her wife and stealing a kiss over their sleeping son’s head. “Did you hear from Nick today or Loretta?”

“Nick sent an email. He’ll be coming home on the train with Carol to visit for a month, but he’s decided to take the offer to stay on as a researcher at Solomons. They’ve made good progress on recreating some of the vaccines that they think might be safe for kids.”

The worry of parenting in the world after the Outbreak is that so many of the very necessary vaccines required refrigeration. While the Dixons had raided supplies before power failed in some areas, it was a finite amount. The girls received the more pertinent vaccines as babies, but the manufactured supplies were depleted before Asher was born. It’s a problem that led to Rachel’s nephew’s request to apprentice at the one community with a full-scale research facility still intact.

“At least we’ll get to celebrate his birthday with him. And he’ll be here for Regan’s birthday. That’s something.”

The fact that Loretta isn’t mentioned bugs Denise a little, but she reminds herself that the girl was already a legal adult when Rachel and Tim scooped her up to bring her south to Georgia. While she nominally maintains ties with Rachel and Tim out of ties to Tim’s former boyfriend, Loretta’s still skittish about actually calling any of them family. Even Denise’s training as a psychiatrist hasn’t bridged the gap. But the young woman is happy enough with her job with the farming contingent, especially entertained by the fact that her birth family’s once illegal occupation of marijuana growing is being encouraged nowadays.

She just hates that Rachel and Tim both worry over Loretta’s ongoing antisocial behavior. She just has to remind herself that some people are just natural loners.

Juli wiggles past her mothers in the doorway, off to seek her own pajamas, but halts and circles back for kisses. She yells out a reminder that it’s Pops turn to do the bedtime story.

That makes Rachel smile. “What do you say we get Asher tucked into his crib and let the boys handle bedtime?”

“Are we sure that Christopher will enforce bedtime and not let Tim take the girls on some nighttime training excursion?” Denise asks, purposely pitching her voice louder.

“I heard that, woman!” Tim calls out from the girls’ bedroom. He sticks his head out of the door and points at her. “That was once, and it was a raid on Tara’s stash of fabric markers. A successful one, I might add.”

The memory of the two little girls dressed all in camo and face paint is still a fond one for Denise. Regan was still so little she was in a back carrier for the ‘raid’. Tara’s retaliatory raid with Meredith and Shannon was equally adorable. She suspects it is a tradition unlikely to stop, considering Tim and Tara’s longtime partnership on scavenger patrols.

“So no raid plans tonight?”

Tim just flashes her a boyish grin as he shows her the title of the paperback in his hands. “None tonight, at least. Just reading Charlotte’s Web.” 

Rachel giggles. “You know that Juli is going to want a pet pig after you read that to them.”

“You should probably be more concerned about the fact that Regan will want a pet spider,” Tim replies.

“Pops! That’s our story, not the mamas!” Juli calls out.

“Well, it seems I’m being summoned.” He comes down the hall and presses a kiss to Asher’s little fuzzy head. “Wake me if he pulls one of his all-nighters again. I’m off duty tomorrow.”

Denise follows Rachel down the hall to their bedroom. The four adults took over one of the larger houses in the Expansion once Denise was pregnant with Juli. It’s spacious, with plenty of room should Denise or Rachel decide three isn’t the final number of offspring for the family. This particular house is especially nice because it had a cottage out back where Christopher’s mother could take up residence. Her best friend’s mother is that mother-in-law of old jokes most days, but she’s a devoted grandmother. Most days, Denise thinks half of the woman’s cantankerous nature is loneliness, but put one of the grandchildren near her and she melts like butter.

It’s a living arrangement that might have been odd before the Outbreak, but nowadays, she thinks it’s even better than anything old world traditional will be. The kids definitely all benefit from having four parents instead of two. She suspects as more time passes, families like hers and the odd trio that Shane, Lori, and Rick and their partners have going will become more common, not less.

Rachel settles the four-month-old into the small crib in their room. It has a twin in Tim and Christopher’s bedroom down the hall. 

When Rachel turns to look over her shoulder, Denise smiles slyly and locks the bedroom door behind her.

> \- < Jazz > \- <

Jazz lets the warm shower water wash over him, wondering if falling asleep standing up is truly possible for humans. He’s close to it, despite catching a nap mid-afternoon between a radio consult with the veterinarian at the Kingdom and the council meeting that finished off the rest of his afternoon all the way until supper time. He loves the rush of a lambing, all the new life entering life successfully if things go well, but the crash after two nights spent snatching sleep here and there in a hammock down at the sheep paddocks is about to knock him flat on his backside.

The shower door opens to allow his husband to join him, so Jazz moves back in the cubicle to give Paul room. His back contacts the cool tile, and he wishes when he designed the place three years ago that he put one of the handy benches in it like his parents have back home in Georgia. His tired mind skitters over a haphazard idea to convert the design, since the shower’s already custom to allow for his height.

Paul tips his head and lets the water soak his long hair, darkening the sunstreaked brown locks to something closer to Jazz’s dark hair. The pale band of skin on his left ring finger reminds Jazz that his own is still on his finger, since he forgot to drop it in the box on their dresser on his way through the bedroom.

“MJ finally go to sleep?” Bedtime, when he’s home, is usually Jazz’s domain, but even the toddler saw his exhaustion and handed his stack of books to Paul instead.

“After four stories, changing his mind twice about which of Grandma’s stuffed animals were sleeping with him tonight, and a lecture that if he doesn’t leave his night pants on, I’m finding the roll of duct tape.”

Jazz can’t help laughing softly. “He knows you’re a pushover for reading stories. He never gets more than two out of me.”

Paul’s determination that MJ’s childhood not resemble anything he remembers of his own lonely one in foster care is one of the things Jazz loves most about him. They originally intended to wait a while longer before having a child, but the opportunity presented itself when it did. Neither of them are so foolish as to turn down a surrogate offer that might not come again. Jazz’s father became a father for the first time at nineteen, too, and Merle did a good job even amidst a lot of challenging circumstances.

“I suspect that is part of why he asked me tonight when you looked tired.” Paul finishes washing his hair, before reaching for the wash cloth Jazz wet in the water but didn’t actually follow through with soaping up. Washing his hair was about as far as he got. “Turn and I’ll get your back.”

The sensation of the soft cloth and warm water across his back and legs is almost enough to finish the job of sending Jazz to sleep and testing out if he can sleep upright like most of his patients. He’s in a pliant half-doze when Paul manipulates him to turn so he can repeat the process starting with his chest. A kiss pressed to his left hip over the ink that flows across his skin there makes him crack his eyes open. 

The tattoos began as an experiment to see if it would help tone down his sensory issues with touch. They do, and lying prone with his music on and Paul’s hands gripped in his usually drops him into what Cricket dubs a trance state the second he hears the needle’s buzz each time he gets work done. It led to a lot of ink on his body, like the red and blue stylized phoenix that covers his left side from shoulder to hip, turning his left obliques into a colorful canvas. The tail feathers are one of Paul’s favorite things to trace on his skin.

The offer evident in his husband’s face makes him almost say yes, because he hasn’t managed more than distracted, chaste affection with Paul since before the lambing began due to claims on both their time.

“I’m not sure either of us are up to getting me to bed if you start that in here.”

Paul smirks at him and rises for a kiss instead. It’s brief, well-practiced to work within Jazz’s limited enjoyment of the sensation of another mouth on his own. The sort of romanticized kissing most couples indulge in is almost always guaranteed to send Jazz into sensory overload simply from having Paul breathing across his face. Paul ducks his head to nuzzle at Jazz’s throat, pressing kisses along the soft skin below his adam’s apple where the combination of warm mouth and textured beard are infinitely more welcome.

Exhaustion recedes in a way he didn’t expect five minutes ago. He reaches over Paul’s shoulder, fumbling for the shower controls to shut off the water. 

“Bedroom,” he cajoles, voice rough. As Paul catches the change in tone, the shorter man smiles slowly, backing out of the shower and reaching for the towels.

Jazz will sleep even better after he’s traded the scent of soap on his skin for his husband’s instead.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In the end, I dropped Axel's scene. It was hard to come up with anything and the rest got fairly long. Since Axel, Oscar, and Tiny aren't likely to feature in ISO, just consider them happily settled with their families... Axel's the chief mechanic for Terminus with his horde of children (including the twin girls from RBM and a toddler son). Oscar's happily reconciled with his ex-wife at Homestead, and Tiny's still Hershel's primary partner at Homestead and papa to an adorable son and daughter.
> 
> RBM Flashback: Rick's daughters are named for Rosita's late brother and nephew (Victor and Ray). ;)
> 
> Out of this chapter, Jazz and Ezekiel are likely the only POVs that will be regularly used in ISO. We won't have nearly as many POVs after the intro chapters to play catchup with where characters landed, just to keep things on a more manageable skill.
> 
> Current plans are a concentration on Dixon POVs and those immediately adjacent, like Shane, Eugene, and Paul. Ezekiel's a bit of a given due to the Saviors.
> 
> Touch sensitivity trivia: People with sensory disorders can often handle inkwork even better than those without, especially if they lack a regular pain threshold like Jazz does. In Jazz's case, he is essentially reprogramming his brain to see the ink as protective as clothing normally would be. The phoenix isn't his only ink. ;)


	5. Storm Breaks

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Shane spends a content early morning with wife and children, Eugene watches the patrols leave Hilltop, and Carol gets the type of news no mother wants to hear.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I named this one separately from the others since it shifts tone by the end.

**May 25, 2017**

> \- < Shane > \- <

Shane wakes to sleepy baby sounds and slides out of the bed. He’s not covert enough not to wake Scout, but the only time he’s managed that was the few times she was sick or recovering from a rare slip into a PTSD episode. There hasn’t been one of those for nearly four years now. While he knows it’s something that will always lurk in the back of her mind, the timespan gives him hope that seeing her laid low like that will be a long time coming again.

His wife is content to let him be the first out of bed, and he’s happy to let her sleep. She was the one up the most during the night last night, after all.

Peering into the side sleeper, he can tell that for once, he’s made it there before Griffin woke his brother. Separating the twins so that the better sleeper, Cameron, could sleep more actually resulted in the opposite. The usually content older twin was inconsolable when Griffin was put in a separate bassinet. How the baby knew that his brother was in a different bed and not just down the hall with a parent, Shane will never understand.

Since Cameron does seem like he might snooze a while longer, Shane lifts his youngest son to his shoulder. “Hey, little man. Let’s sneak off together and let the slugabeds sleep a while longer, okay?”

The soft giggle from where Scout’s pulled the sheet up over her head makes him smile.

No matter how quiet he is going down the hall, he can’t slip past Judith any easier than he can slip away from Scout. His six-year-old shadow follows him to the kitchen, sliding a stool to the sink and filling the kettle. He gets a couple of bags of donated breast milk out of the fridge and hands them off to Judith before going to make sure Griffin doesn’t go from soggy to worse during his breakfast.

He spares a thought that the women who volunteered milk so easily for Scout’s child probably didn’t expect she would need a double order of it. Not that any of the various currently nursing mothers of Homestead cared. Their freezer shows it.

“You don’t have to get up every morning you’re here, Judy.”

His youngest daughter shrugs. “I know, but I want to. I like helping with babies.”

That’s probably a good trait, considering she has two younger sisters and spends enough time with Rick’s daughters that they’ve had visitors think she was his brother’s child. Rick has never faltered in his promise that he would be the best uncle Judith would ever need. Considering the size of Judith’s extended family of Dixons, that’s a tall order.

No one really figured on Shane and Scout being the next one to add babies for Judith to oversee. Scout’s inability to have children was just an accepted fact, and with Anaya and Judith, his wife never seemed to worry about that being the end sum of their family. That changed when he came home one day last summer to find her sister voicing an extraordinary birthday present for Scout.

There will come a day when Judith will understand the biological significance of Meredith, Shannon, and the twins to herself, but until then, it’s the tiny brothers who hold her fascination. They arrived a full month early, as twins were prone to do, the first set of identical twins in any of the Georgia communities. But they’re healthy and growing - and keeping Shane and Scout on their toes.

The kettle whistles that odd sound before a full boil. Judith scampers to the couch, climbing up and crooking her arm in an unspoken request for Griffin to be settled into her embrace. He tucks the baby into her arms and goes to thaw out the milk.

“You’ve got school today, right?” he asks Judith.

“Yeah. We did a science scavenger hunt yesterday, and today we’re going to make a lab book with all that we found that we get to bring home to keep.”

“Sounds like it’s going to involve a lot of glue and coloring.”

“Lots. But no glitter because it’s not good for babies.”

Shane would be happy if someone would ban glitter entirely, but so far, Carol’s laughed off the not-quite-joking request. Luckily, Judith’s not as enamored of the craft supply as Anaya and Abby were.

“Glad to hear that.” He drops the two warmed up bags into the bottles and tightens the lids. Cameron hasn’t woken yet that he can hear, but he’s rarely more than half an hour behind his twin. No point in warming water twice.

Sitting on the couch next to Judith, he lets her take the bottle. Her bright smile as she gets the baby to latch on makes him slide an arm around her to hug her close. “Anaya should be home for a visit this weekend.”

That had been one of their debates in his oldest daughter’s apprenticeship, since Anaya turned sixteen at the beginning of May. With the boys on the way, Anaya initially decided there was nothing wrong with waiting an extra six months to a year before she apprenticed. The fact that she would go to Tybee or Jekyll was a given, since everyone knew the girl’s true love was the ocean, whether swimming in it like the dolphins or learning to the workings of a boat that brought in catches to help keep the people of their communities fed.

In the end, she finally bent to the logic that going now was even better than later, since the babies wouldn’t remember much of their first six months. Technically her apprenticeship should last a full two years, but it’s not so far away that travel isn’t fairly easy. He foresees a lot of time at the shore for the Homestead half of the family in their future.

Griffin is just finishing off his bottle when Scout appears with Cameron, the baby’s tiny fist tangled in her braid like it’s a source of comfort. It’s still odd to see her wander the house in soft pajamas. The moment she saw the first ultrasound, long before they knew their special gift was going to be doubled, Scout announced she was retiring from the field indefinitely once the baby arrived. It will never cease to be strange to not see Scout leading her team out in the field, but as she said, it gives leadership experience to others.

“Good morning, Nåna. I’ve fed Griffin all his breakfast already,” Judith announces, brandishing the empty bottle as Shane eases his son onto his shoulder to burp him. As good as Judy is about most baby care, burping is not one of her skill sets yet.

“So I see. Do you want to feed Cameron, too, or help with our breakfast?”

The six-year-old’s eyes go wide, even as Shane lays Griffin down in the living room’s playpen for a post-bottle snooze. “I’ll help Tåta with breakfast, while you feed Cameron.”

Scout laughs. “I figured we would let Tåta cook either way. Today is not the day I magically learn to cook eggs.”

It isn’t quite as bad as it used to be, where years of the military curtailed most ability or interest Scout had in the kitchen. But for some persistent reason, his wife cannot manage to successfully cook eggs if her life depended on it.

“Okay. Then I want to feed Cameron, too.”

Shane just hides his grin as best he can, kissing Scout in passing as he heads for the kitchen. “Omelettes?”

“Of course,” she replies, going to take his place next to Judith.

As he starts to crack eggs into a bowl, he watches his wife with two of their children and can’t imagine any better life he could lead.

> \- < Eugene > \- <

Even though they’ve lived together for six years, Eugene will never cease to be amazed that his life includes Honey at its very center. They’ve never taken the formal step to being married that everyone expects, not that it matters much to their family. Ceremonies really aren’t required for their family and friends to consider them irrevocably linked. He would give Honey whatever ceremony she required, but since that currently is still none at all, he’s content.

The last four years they’ve lived at Hilltop, and honestly, he was surprised that Honey lasted that long before she followed her brother north. The family bets were that she wouldn’t make it a single season. He didn’t even have the chance to miss their original little cottage, because she promptly reconstructed its twin in the cluster of small homes that sprung up at Hilltop as the original FEMA trailers slowly outlived their usefulness.

He’s going to have to take another shower, since he didn’t make it out of his towel this morning before Honey lured him back to bed and undid every bit of cleaning he accomplished. She smiles down at him as she moves away to sit up, smiling with that same smug Cheshire smile she always has when she distracts him into losing a half hour with her.

“You headed out on patrol today?” he asks, sliding his fingers across the field of wildflowers that landscape her back. Tiny bees alight on the flowers, joined by other hidden wildlife. His favorites are a tiny mouse holding a sunflower seed near her right hip, and a spider spinning a beautiful web that spans onto her left shoulder. The garden continues onto her belly, with vines reaching between her breasts to curl against her collarbones.

She turns and leans in for a kiss, flashing the gender flipped Doctor Who quote that encompasses her left inner forearm. It matches the only tattoo he bears, which has the last lines of the quote curled around a pocket watch. He draws a finger gently along _She's like the night and the storm in the heart of the sun_ on her arm and smiles.

“Yeah. We’re escorting one of the Solomons scientists back home and taking them some fresh produce in trade for enough tuna for us to be sick of the stuff by summer’s end. You working on the new engine concept?” She reaches out and tugs his long ponytail lightly, winding the length of it around her hand. Her love of toying with his hair is why he thinks he would never cut it.

“Might as well. Eventually we’ll get something more durable for ethanol than we currently have to expand our fuel capacities. If we could use the ethanol primarily for manufacturing, we can reserve biodiesel for the vehicles.” 

She lets his hair slide slowly from her fingers. “I need to see if Jazz minds me borrowing Logan for the day. Camille mentioned on the radio last night that they need someone to do some checks on their rabbits on the island.”

“He’ll probably enjoy getting a trip outside the walls.”

“To go flirt with pretty girls who spend half their time on sailboats, you mean.”

Eugene just laughs. “He’s seventeen, Honey, that’s to be expected. Danny's team is going, too, right?" 

With the extra security patrols, they usually don't send out any fewer than three teams of four for security. All the teams are pretty good, due to Honey's training, but he likes the former Marine out with her best.

"Yeah. His team and Kenneth Sutton's." Honey stretches, her skin shimmering in the sunlight beginning to creep into their bedroom. “Going to shower. Wash my back?” 

Eugene hasn’t turned down that invitation in six years. He certainly isn’t going to start today.

An hour later, he's standing near the gates, stealing one last kiss as he sees Logan's blond hair disappear into Honey's cargo truck. Danny leans out the window of the next truck, wolf whistling at them and laughing when Honey calmly flips him the bird. The former Marine looks far more like Logan's sibling than Honey does, but the two aren't the only blonds among the adopted Dixons. 

Case in point is Eugene's own apprentice, climbing onto the running board to tease Danny into a sweet kiss. He wonders what the girl's father will think of that, but he can't see any Dixon objecting to one of Scout's Marines.

"We'll be home by supper," Honey promises as she climbs into the driver's seat and smiles down at him.

"We'll be waiting." Eugene steps back out of the way of the trucks, reaching a hand down to brush it across Augustus's greying head. They watch the gates shut behind the trucks, and he looks down at the elderly catahoula.

"C'mon, boy. Let's get to work."

> \- < Carol > \- <

Carol checks the guest room one last time. It’s almost the end of her time in Virginia, and she always ends these trips with at least four or five days at the Kingdom. The early friendship she struck up with Ezekiel has endured for years, despite the vast majority of it being conducted through emails and the occasional radio conversation between her trips north.

His community is the spearpoint of them all, protecting their north in a way that Homestead protects the south and west, and Hilltop often sweeps into the Carolinas and the land gone wild with no humans to inhabit it. It’s an easy system, although Carol often wishes that everyone were closer. 

Shouldering her duffel bag, she heads for the stairs in the old dormitory that’s slowly ceased to house the majority of the Kingdom’s people as they spread out into permanent, individual residences like most of the communities under years of peace that make everyone look forward and not back. Pausing on the stairs, she feels a chill roll over her that she can't quite define. Shaking away the odd feeling, she continues on her way down.

She’s reached the big communal dining hall that still serves meals to those who don’t have the time or inclination to eat. Ezekiel waves her over, and she can see that Abraham and Michonne are both already seated with the king and his family for lunch. She slides into the seat opposite of Dianne, nodding to the blonde who serves as both queen and chief of security for Ezekiel now.

“Our scouts swept west to check on the cranberry bogs across the state line,” he tells her. “They expect we’ll have a bumper crop this year to trade with everyone.”

“Something tells me that Homestead better start stockpiling shrimp,” Carol replies as she heaps roasted vegetables onto her plate from the big serving bowl on the table.

“Shrimp, of course, but Shiva would also appreciate one of those large water buffalo.”

Carol laughs at the blatant hint. “Shiva can have a water buffalo or two long before there are cranberries to trade. You know half my family is in love with her.”

“We should figure out how to run a herd up here, if we can do so,” Dianne suggests. “Although it would remove Daryl’s excuse to visit with fresh meat for his friend if we did.”

“I’m sure he would find some other animal that suits a tiger for a treat if he needed to,” Michonne remarks.

The feeling from the stairs returns, and Carol can't focus on the conversation. She loses focus on the room, just breathing deep and trying to place what is wrong.

A warm hand on her arm jolts her back. Michonne's looking at her with concerned, dark eyes. "Is something wrong?"

"I don't know. I feel like I need to crawl right out of my skin."

"Dad!" A teenage runner skids to a stop, trying to catch his breath.

"Yes, Benjamin?" Ezekiel looks concerned, and from what Carol knows of the boy, this isn't his norm to be excitable.

"Daniel sent me. Solomons radioed in to Hilltop that the Hilltop patrols is three hours overdue. Hilltop alerted us."

That crazy cold feeling grips Carol fully. "Which patrols went out today?"

Dianne pulls a notebook out of a pocket on her BDU pants. Her expression softens as she looks back up. "Plans were for Honey to lead this patrol."

"I need to get to the radio," Carol says. Everyone is rising to their feet, and Ezekiel slips a hand under her elbow. 

"I'll lead you to it."

Dianne splits off as soon as they're outside the building. "I'll gather our patrol teams. Abraham? If you'll do the same?"

The big redhead nods, disappearing without a word to round up his teams. Michonne stays with Ezekiel and Carol. The small building at the base of the water tower isn't that far away, but it seems like miles.

"Daniel! Do you still have Hilltop on radio?"

The blond man nods and cues the mike. "Hilltop, we have Carol and Michonne here."

It's Paul's voice that Carol hears. "Carol, Honey took three teams out to escort someone home to Solomons this morning around seven. They radioed in at the midpoint of the route she chose, but nothing since." He pauses, and Carol gets the horrible feeling he's about to add to her anxiety about Honey. "Logan went out on Honey's team."

Carol curses, understanding for the first time why men like to punch things when they're angry and afraid. It's not just her resourceful, Marine trained adult daughter out there, but her seventeen year old son.

"Is there any reason she might go radio silent?" Carol begins mentally running through protocols, coming up with a few.

"Yes, but there are silent alerts that go out. We got nothing."

"Alright. Dianne and Abraham are readying patrols. We'll start sweeps from here south. I'll ask Alexandria to send out a patrol, and you see if Solomons can help Hilltop by sweeping from the east."

"I've got four teams loading up as we speak."

Carol bids him farewell, while Daniel gets in touch with Alexandria to relay the request. When she steps back into the sunlight, Abraham is waiting, with body armor in hand.

"Let's get you and Chonne geared up and go find our people," the burly redhead says gruffly.

It's been years since Carol wore full military gear, but she lets Abe guide her through them. Once the last strap is adjusted, she turns back to Ezekiel, who is similarly geared. 

"Do we raise the alarm with Homestead?" he asks, tying back his dreads with a soft fabric band.

Her first instinct is to say yes, because Merle needs to know. But she shakes her head, because Homestead is twelve hours away, and unable to help. "Not until we know more."

With luck, only one parent gets to be terrified today.

> \- < > \- < > \- <

On a roadside, a bloodied blond crawls from beneath the too still body of a man he calls brother. His body aches from the bullet that tore through his ribs, but he's still breathing and not choking on blood. He scrambles through the EMT bag of one of his dead teammates, jamming the special pressure bandage in place where he can feel far too much blood outside rather than in. He gropes his back under the body armor and doesn't feel an exit wound. 

The attackers left no vehicles and no obvious weapons, and he can only be grateful they aren't as well trained as his people as he applies another bandage to the graze wound that made a mess of the side of his head. Despite his injuries, he checks each body to make sure they won't turn.

At the end, he confirms what he hoped was trauma from the head wound. Honey isn't among the dead, which means he probably didn't hallucinate her limp form being shoved into a truck and driven away.

He lurches to his knees, vomiting from pain and fear. But then he finds one of her knives buried in the gut of an attacker and wrenches the curved karambit from the dead stranger. Slipping his blood slick fingers into the grips, he stumbles forward.

Alexandria is closest. 

He has to find help. 

One foot in front of the other, he ignores the fact that the dampness on his face is no longer just blood. 

He rubs at the tears and walks.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't cliffhanger often, but... Maybe y'all won't drag out the torches and pitchforks just yet.
> 
> Poor Scout has the world's shortest military retirement... ☹️
> 
> And I think most had narrowed it down to Honey being Negan's captive by now, but if you hadn't...
> 
> The two major clues are the body modification and the garrote. Honey is the only female in RBM with a habit of modification (although it was still just a lot of piercings then), and Eugene vowed to be the Q to her James Bond. He is definitely the type that would design an underwire garrote. 
> 
> Honey's tattoo is a line from an episode with the 10th Doctor: "He's like fire and ice and rage. He's like the night and the storm in the heart of the sun. He's ancient and forever. He burns at the centre of time and can see the turn of the universe." The final phrase is "And he's wonderful."


	6. We're Going to Find Her

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As Logan is found and rushed to surgical care, the rest of his family rallies to find who took such a personal toll on the Dixons.

**May 25, 2017**

> \- < Aaron > \- <

Even the arrival of the refugees didn't really upset the processes of life in Alexandria. The only real change was no one traveling unescorted. Considering their supply teams are the ones that typically brave DC periodically, those who venture outside the walls are used to being on high alert.

Having one of the kids come running so fast he literally went sprawling when he tried to stop was the first clue Aaron received that today was about to change everything. The kid was rattled beyond the embarrassment of his tumble. The second was Spencer's face when Aaron reached the watch room, which looked like a new apocalypse was dawning upon them.

Alexandria may not be the most militant of the communities, but Spencer rallied four teams together within half an hour. He ordered physical guards on the walls, instead of just video watch. They haven't had actual guards on the walls in years.

Despite the worry that something has caused twelve of Hilltop's best to disappear, the Alexandrians still split into two groups. Spencer leads his southwest to intercept one section of the route Honey's teams took. Aaron leads his southeast to do the same. They'll meet in the middle, with others converging around them.

"Holy Mother of God," Annie grinds out, stomping on the brakes. Aaron sees what she does and slams his door open.

"Aaron! What if he's a walker?"

"Then I owe it to his family to lay him to rest."

He isn't foolhardy enough not to ready his knife. With two children at home, no one expects him to risk orphaning them by not being cautious. Approaching the limping teenager with a heavy heart, he takes note of the bandage on the teenager's head and prays that's a good sign.

"Logan?"

The teen stumbles to a halt and turns his head as if any fast movement will roll it off his shoulders. "Aaron?"

While slurred, the name is distinct enough that there's no way the boy's turned yet. Aaron sheathes his knife and goes to catch Logan as his strength seems to give out.

"Heath! Holly! Someone give me a hand!" Logan might not be a biological Dixon, and nowhere near Jazz's size, but he's easily the same height and weight as Aaron.

Heath reaches his side, and they manage to sling Logan between them and get him to the back of the truck. Holly has the med kit ready, and Aaron sees her lip quiver. As Jazz's apprentice, they've gotten used to seeing the teen at Alexandria. It isn't a stranger they're treating.

Aaron waits just long enough for Holly to assess that the situation is desperately bad before running back to the cab. He keys the mike on the radio even as Annie turns the truck around. Behind them, the second team of four follows. He can see that the front passenger has their rifle at ready, and Aaron bets Heath is doing similar in the back of this truck.

"Everyone be on alert. We have a survivor in need of emergency care. My teams are en route back to Alexandria." He pauses, taking a deep breath. "Carol. It's Logan."

He isn't surprised that Carol's voice is rock steady. "Describe his injuries."

Aaron glances back into the bed of the truck, where Holly has an IV started. The young woman looks terrified, and he doesn't blame her. She's a medic, not a doctor.

"Two gunshot wounds. One to the head, a second to the torso. He was ambulatory and headed toward Alexandria. We didn't get any information before he lost consciousness."

He can't imagine getting a report like that on one of his family members, and it is enough to make him feel blessed that Eric rarely leaves Alexandria since they adopted their children.

"Location, please. My other teams will stay on search, but half of us will divert to Alexandria."

That's wonderful news. Alexandria has a good doctor, but Dana isn't a surgeon of Emmett Carson's caliber. At least Carol has an extensive amount of experience as a surgical nurse.

Aaron gives out their location, which hopefully will help them locate the other twelve people traveling with Logan. In the meantime, he takes the rifle from the gun rack in the truck and helps make sure nothing approaches their mini-convoy undetected.

>-< Jesus >-<

Paul already knew the discovery probably won't be anything hopeful as soon as he heard Aaron's shaken voice as he relayed finding Logan. There's no way in hell that his little brother would abandon his teams easily, although he tries to think Logan could be disoriented and trying to go for help.

Spencer's teams locate the missing Hilltoppers first, by virtue of being closer. By the time Paul's teams reach the location given, Camille from Solomons is on site as well. He pulls alongside one of the Alexandrian vehicles and parks.

The three cargo trucks with their loads of produce are nowhere to be found, only the sprawled forms of their lost people. It adds one clue to the mystery that they encountered bandits and not walkers. How the hell they got the drop on Honey's well-trained people, he cannot begin to understand.

"Jazz, I can handle this."

His husband reaches out and squeezes his hand. "I'm the council representative for Hilltop here." With that, Jazz exits the Humvee, leaving Paul to take a deep breath of his own and motion for his teams to unload.

They meet at the rear of the vehicle, where the second Humvee is parked behind. "Pair up and prepare to search once I see what Spencer and Camille have underway."

Not waiting for their acknowledgement, he joins Jazz where he is working alongside Camille to reconstruct what happened. It was one of the woman's areas of expertise before the Outbreak, forensics, although she's spent most of the last seven years as a more traditional sort of doctor. Around them, Camille's people are standing guard on high alert.

"Spencer's got his folks working a search grid in the woods north of the road," Camille says, looking up from where she's checking Kenneth Sutton's body for wounds. "South's pretty much open field, so you might see about helping Spencer."

"Who are we looking for?" Paul's gaze sweeps over the bodies, which haven't been moved from where they initially were found.

"Honey's missing," Jazz replies from further away. His voice is thick with emotion, and Paul realizes that the younger man is knelt next to Danny's too still body. He is examining the body with gentle precision even as he speaks.

Oh dear God. It takes seconds to do a count. Honey led four teams out, plus the Solomons scientist. There are only eleven bodies he recognizes, although there are four strangers, their clothing distinctly different from anything the Virginians wear.

As Paul strides back to issue orders to his people, he prays Honey is disoriented and seeking help like Logan. He isn't sure anyone here is ready to have to put down a walker wearing Honey Dixon's face.

>-< Merle >-<

Merle hasn't felt this level of foreboding terror since he was stuck in a Humvee rushing back to Homestead during the Governor's attack. Now he's even further away, one of his children is missing, and another is gravely injured. And Danny may have resisted any official adoption, not feeling the same need for family that Jamie had, but he's beloved and a Dixon whether he claims it or not.

Jesus, Scout's youngest Marine was only twenty-six.

Scout has gone as cold as he's ever seen her, dropping back into that remote Marine facet of her personality they've been seeing less and less of. The evidence that their people have never lost their militant edge shows as the convoy is being systematically readied under her orders.

But even as clear as the roads likely are thanks to patrols, they're still at least eight hours south of where they need to be.

"Cricket!" he calls out as he sees his daughter darting to the designated medical vehicle with a cart of supplies. Virginia has plenty, but no one will travel unprepared. 

She hands off the task to an older teen he knows is apprenticed at the infirmary and moves to meet him halfway. "Please don't tell me I can't go, Dad. Lilly and T-Dog will stay with Tara and the kids."

That thought hadn't even crossed his mind. "Is Welles clear to fly?"

Cricket makes the connection easily and shakes her head. "He's a week after hernia surgery. I wouldn't even clear him for ground travel."

Merle considers the downside of pilot training being a minor skill few see the use of, because of the vast consumption of fuel limiting the use of the helicopters they have in possession. But they've been maintained for emergencies.

Only four people are qualified to pilot the Huey Welles brought with him to Homestead, the only helicopter with the expanded fuel capacity to make it to Virginia without refueling. Two of them are already in Virginia, and Welles is under medical care.

"Is it safe for Sophia to fly?" he asks at last, hating the necessity.

"She's more than eight weeks from her due date on a remarkably easy pregnancy, so I would say yes. Better than double the time in military vehicles, and you know she's not staying behind anymore than I am."

Merle is aware of that, because he knows that there's already a group loading up at King's Cross to go north. "Go radio her to meet us here."

He receives a fierce hug from Cricket before she runs toward the infirmary and the radio there. Merle scans for the rest of his immediate family and goes to the school playground, where he can see Ava among the children hovering at the fence. She runs to him, all but climbing him to get into his arms.

"I want to go, too, Daddy," she pleads.

Merle presses a firm kiss against her forehead. "I need you to stay here, sweetheart, and help Tara and Aunt Lori."

His sister-in-law meets his eyes from her spot at the picnic table where she's helping Rick and another teacher try to keep up some semblance of normalcy for the children whose parents are about to deploy. She sets down the basket of snacks and nudges Rick before going to the gate.

"Ava, can you help me with the little ones? Some aren't big enough to feed themselves."

Appealing to her helpful nature works, because the impending tears recede as Ava squirms to be let down. As she jogs over to settle next to one of the toddlers, he sighs.

"You going to be okay with two more, plus the twins?"

Lori smiles reassuringly. "I'm good. Maggie and Patricia will be plenty of help. Won't be the first time your house has been full of a hodgepodge family."

"I'll be back by before I leave." Even if he flies, which he's going to insist on, he suspects they'll leave at the same time as the convoy. "I doubt any community here is in danger, but stay alert."

The slim brunette pats her holster, expression turning grim. "Just like I was taught."

Lori is called away then, and Merle detests seeing guns on the damned playground again. Years of peace have allowed them to relax so many things. Homestead was surprised before, and despite the threat possibly being five hundred miles away, no one is taking chances.

He leaves the playground as he sees Daryl and Shane jointly loading one of the military cargo trucks. When he approaches, he alerts them by clearing his throat. As much as Merle loathes the idea of both Shane and Scout going north with two newborns, he understands why it's happening. The boys have a much wider support system than the old style family system had. They know Lori almost as well as their own parents, even this young.

"We're sending the Huey ahead."

Daryl grimaces. "You sure that's a good idea? It's not subtle."

"No, it's not. But four hours faster is more help with the search."

"Welles can't fly, and Michonne and Noah are in Virginia," Shane begins, but the penny drops quickly. "Oh, shit. Sophia?"

"She's been given medical clearance, so she should be here by the time we're ready to go." With any luck, Carol won't have his balls for not opposing it.

"What about the other one?" Daryl asks.

"Doesn't have the auxiliary tanks installed right now," Shane replies, falling back on his security post easily. Apache is less useful for long flight."

Considering the Huey's been used a handful for medical rescues, Merle supposes that makes sense. They still have years of fuel stockpiled and carefully treated, but the Huey is more versatile than the gunship.

"How fast can we get that taken care of?" Merle asks, thinking over what they might need. If it's a random group, the Apache is overkill. But that other group that the women and children fled? The reports dictate something even larger than Homestead.

"I can get Jim's team on it. Rosita is on her way back with some of Terminus's guards. But without a second pilot, we can't take both."

"I'll radio Hilltop to ready the train and get Noah down here. We need to be prepared for every possibility." 

"How bad is it, really, Merle?"

"We don't know yet. Until Logan wakes, we don't even have enough information to do more than search. They're predicting at least another hour of surgery, and the head injury makes him waking up unpredictable."

It isn't just Dana at Alexandria now. As soon as Aaron located Logan, both Hilltop and the Kingdom sent backup security teams to escort the Carson brothers. Emmett Carson's experience as a cardiothoracic surgeon is the teenager's best bet for survival with the chest wound. But the one thing they don't have is a neurosurgeon.

Shane runs a hand over his head, making the black curls go wild. "He's a tough kid. He'll pull through."

Merle certainly hopes so. The Dixons already lost one of their own, not to mention the Hilltop losses. One more, barely older than a child, will mean whoever is behind this will regret it even more than they already plan for them to.

>-< Shane >-<

Their last checks are complete and all the farewells given as Shane passes a final gear bag to Carl in the Huey. "Be safe. Keep an eye on everyone for me."

The young man smiles, but it's an expression without joy. "I will. Y'all won't be long behind us, anyway."

Carl glances over his shoulder where Sophia is giving her father a crash course in monitoring the gauges and conditions. She's never flown without Welles before, and Shane can see the tension in her shoulders.

"We'll be coming fast as we can, I promise." Shane drags his nephew into a bear hug. The offer for him or Scout or both to go on the helicopter was made, but someone needs to lead their teams north. They won't make it to Virginia before dark, unfortunately.

A big hand clamps on Shane's shoulder. He lets Carl go and turns to find Daryl. "Scout's hunting you. You sure you're both good with going? No one is going to fault you for staying," the younger man tells him.

How does Shane admit that as much as he doesn't want to take both parents from the twins for any length of time, he isn't sure anyone else can really get through to Scout when she's in the mode she's in now? There's no way she'll stay, not with Danny dead, Logan injured, and Honey missing. The babies are young enough that they'll be okay for a few days.

"If it seems we'll be gone very long, once we've assessed security, we can bring them to Hilltop." Shane actually considered it today, but their pace is too rough for infants. Once they're sure of what's going on, then maybe all of the kids can be brought north. If not, they may be sending other children south.

"Alright." Daryl turns him loose and tosses a bag in the Huey. "Stay safe on the ground."

With a nod, Shane backs up, letting the rest of those flying north, all Daryl's hunter teams plus Cricket, load into the helicopter. "Go find our girl," he calls out.

Daryl salutes him from the doorway before sliding it closed. The Huey lifts into the air as smoothly as if Welles were flying, rising to altitude and putting on speed. By the time Shane reaches the lead Humvee where Scout is waiting, it's out of sight.

"You want me to drive?" he asks, running a hand along Scout's forearm where she's leaned against the frame of the open window.

She shakes her head. "Need the distraction."

Shane rounds the front of the vehicle, looking back to see everyone is loaded up. When it seems they are, he climbs inside and shuts his door. Scout puts the Humvee in gear.

As they pass through the last of the gates, a runner closing it behind them, Shane reaches over and slides his fingers around her elbow. His wife looks down at his fingers against her pulse point in an imitation of her comfort move. It's not a smile, but her expression relaxes just a fraction from that rigid sterness she's been stuck in since the alert summoned them to the watch room.

"We'll find her." He can't imagine anything else.

Scout nods, but doesn't speak, turning her eyes back to the long road ahead.

>-< Carol >-<

Logan still hasn't regained consciousness hours after surgery. No one tries to dissuade Carol from her vigil next to her son's side. She's never regretted the loss of MRI technology more than now, when all they can do is X-rays and surgery.

His blond hair is completely shaved on one side, although you can't tell under the bandages. It's a waiting game to see if his brain can heal from the skull fracture, because anything invasive is as likely to kill him as the original injury. 

At least he's breathing on his own, although he's got as much wire as stitching holding his torso back together. Emmett spent hours finding bone fragments, removing the two floating ribs, and making internal repairs. The injury is eerily reminiscent of Rick Grimes's medical records Carol reviewed years ago.

Just like Rick's police body armor failed when he was shot from the side, Logan's failed because military grade armor or not, he wasn't wearing side plates. They have had miracles happen before, so she can only wait and pray that Logan making it this far is a good thing. It has to be.

They lost Danny today. They can't lose Logan, too.

The whomp-whomp-whomp of an approaching helicopter drags her attention from the monitoring equipment. As much as she hates the idea of her pregnant daughter flying, she can't deny that having her family here faster is something she's grateful for. She waits in the tiny infirmary, knowing they'll come to her.

It's the quietest she's seen them in ages when Merle, Cricket, Sophia, and Carl arrive. She can hear others outside, but they're talking to Eric and Aaron. It's likely that they're being prepped to join the search teams. Finding Honey may be a needle in a haystack, but they have to keep trying.

She lets Merle envelope her in his strong arms, drawing strength from his sturdy form. The girls bypass both parents to hover over Logan. Sophia steals Carol's chair, easing the teen's hand in both of hers and speaking too softly for her mother to hear. It's no surprise that Cricket has the chart, reviewing it while fighting off tears at the sight before her.

It's Carl who finally speaks, hands gripping white knuckled on the footboard of the hospital bed. "We're going to find who did this and make them regret ever being born, aren't we?"

"Yes, son, we most certainly are," Merle replies.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Timeline wise, keep in mind that Honey was captured around 40 hours before meeting Negan. Next chapter will be focused on her, however.
> 
> I do need to remind readers that this isn't a fire and brimstone war story. Negan's fall will be a coup from within, much like how Eugene betrayed him in the show.


	7. Weaving the Web

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Honey reflects on what she's learned about the Saviors on her tour and plans to save the innocents and protect her own people at the same time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A Negan chapter - but not Negan's POV. 
> 
> Shouldn't be a bad one, but it does contain a reference to Honey and Eugene having a less than conventional sex life.

** May 27, 2017 **

Honey relaxes in bath water run so hot it’s nearly burning, allowing the almost-pain sensation to draw away the actual aches throughout her body. She didn’t lie when she told the monster who leads this place that her ribs were cracked. It’s happened a few times in the past, all the way back to her lacrosse days to training accidents more recently. 

The time in that dark hole at least let her assess her injuries and plan, giving her time to grieve. These ‘Saviors’ may have accidentally done her a favor by the confinement. Like a wounded animal bereft of her pack, she mourned her brothers’ deaths - her people’s deaths - and wove all that loss into determination to make the people who took them from her pay dearly. Reaching for the washcloth and soap, she begins to scrub away the sweat, blood, and filth clinging to her body like a protective second skin.

It doesn’t escape her notice in the least that Negan is taking exactly the interest in her that her kidnappers intended. The man’s aware of it at least, little fooled by his own men’s wish to turn his attention somewhere new. Parading Honey into the set of rooms that was once the bridal suite to show off his ‘wives’ made her even more aware of the predator by her side. He may detest the idea of force, because she sensed no untruth in his delight in her extinguishing the life of the inept rapist guard, but he’s just more subtle than Dave was.

Unlike the asshole guard, this bastard likes to wear the illusion that his sex partners consent to the act.

Perhaps two of the wives do consent, drawn to power or luxury or whatever reason they don’t mind bedding the man, but Honey can’t get the image of the youngest one out of her head. Amber is afraid of Negan, barely able to keep from flinching when he deliberately drew her close to him and stared at Honey over her thin shoulder. It will take some subtlety to figure out how to best free the girl from whatever shackles her ‘husband’ has on her.

Playing along with the madman initially was only to find out the lay of the land and scope out the best way to escape and then lead her militia back here. By now, over two full days since she left Hilltop, the troops will be amassing, Georgia and Virginia both. They’ve been on the lookout for this danger for a few months now, and twelve of Hilltop’s best going missing? That’s a red flag for the Virginia communities.

The fact that these bastards killed two Dixons? Half of Georgia is probably camped on Hilltop’s land by now.

Honey isn’t sure whether her family and her people will assume her dead, and she’s not worried if they do. It’s not finding her that’s important right now, and those who know her best will know she can probably get herself out. Dead or alive, they won’t stop until they’ve removed the bastards from this earth.

But now she has a different problem. Escape and revenge were the easy solution, when she thought she was dealing with someone like the bandits who attacked Terminus or that group of rapists Scout hunted down and executed back when the dead first walked. This place, this false Sanctuary, it’s a Woodbury or a Grady. The innocents outnumber the potentially guilty at least twice over.

Whatever monster the man behind the barb wire bat is, Negan isn’t a pure bandit. She suspects he’s more warlord, gathering those to serve those who wield weapons. It’s a perverse reflection of what her own people do, all the way down to the points system set in place. 

There’s enough military power amassed among the Allied Communities to wipe these Saviors off the map if she got a real estimate of their fighter numbers. Even adding in the civilians here as potential fighters, the Allies could swarm this place and raze it to the ground.

But the problem with going to war is the same that faced them in taking out Woodbury: innocents will die. More importantly to Honey, her own people will die, just like they did the day that Woodbury attacked Homestead. She isn’t willing to draw that wrath down on this place yet, not when there are other ways to remove a threat.

This room she’s been shown to couldn’t be more opposite of the dank little cell. She actually recognizes the resort from the tour the preening peacock took her on, because the buildings are the sort of distinctive that you simply don’t forget. All this time they’ve been patrolling Virginia and even risking DC because the refugees said the man favored cities over countryside, and the bastard is sixty miles north of the Kingdom on the banks of the Potomac in a damned resort in Maryland.

From the balcony of this suite, she can see the bridge across the Potomac and the green growth that retook the national park location between here and the river. Just up the crumbling interstate is a town whose multiple colleges were raided by Ezekiel’s people for the knowledge held in their halls and libraries. Her own home is a hundred miles south of here.

They are too fucking close to the ones Honey needs to protect, and she knows that to do what needs to be done, she will have to give up a community to fulfill the illusion that there are serfs willing to serve Negan’s lord of the land fantasies. As she washes her long hair, she ponders the risks. 

The Kingdom is closest, and Ezekiel’s command structure would make it much easier to convince him to play along. The man understands the value of compromise in a way few others do. It doesn’t hurt that the Kingdom expanded its original agricultural base and kept at it, and their very playacting at having a King means the entire place feels more like a renaissance festival than any other community in the Alliance. Their soldiers and military might are completely hidden, like a sleeping dragon curled around its hoard.

Hilltop is her home, almost as deeply as Homestead. But like Homestead, hiding what Hilltop is, the military leader of Virginia, is nearly impossible. While plenty of their military caches are hidden away underground, they’ve shifted to manufacturing. It may be only Industrial Revolution scale with much better working conditions, but there’s no mistaking their foundry or refinery for what it is. The acres of fields, orchards, and pastures will do little to hide that Eugene’s clever engineering miracles there.

Alexandria is out of the question. Spencer and Aaron do their best, but the small community is always on a knife’s edge, and Deanna is too unpredictable to put to the test. The damned woman needs to give in to the inevitable and retire, instead of this no man’s land her son directs their community from.

Solomons is equally off the table. It’s too valuable a resource, and she doesn’t know if this Negan is capable of appreciating the research underway there to try to find an end to the walking dead. Despite tests and predictions swearing that the original hordes will fade away in time, and signs that it’s starting to happen seven years later, it doesn’t stop their own people from turning.

Every single person Honey knows wants to return to a world where a loved one’s death doesn’t have to be followed by a blade to the brain. She’ll die before she volunteers that island to Negan’s goons.

Hilltop or the Kingdom? She isn’t Council at Hilltop, by her own choice. Just like Paul, she prefers not to be immersed in the day-to-day details of running a community of over two hundred people. Her brother is, though, and she knows Jazz is pragmatic enough to play along. He could easily convince Olivia, but the others are wildcards. 

Michael Fisher sometimes seems to have replaced Gregory as the stubborn force on the Council since the old jackass died. Noah’s father will react to the perceived danger to his family more than seeing the bigger picture, and the lingering loyalty to Honey’s family for saving his life in Atlanta and his family’s lives at Shirewilt won’t hold enough sway anymore. Emmett Carson might be persuaded, because the man’s training as a surgeon makes him naturally drop into logical thinking. Bertie is too much a school teacher still to want the children of Hilltop on the radar of a man like Negan.

With the possibility of the vote going three to two not to concede to the Saviors’ demands for a tithe, she doesn’t think she can risk it. The fact that there are nine families at Hilltop in addition to her own who lost loved ones will be something the Council has to consider as well. This will make her a monster in their eyes.

In time, Honey thinks Ezekiel will forgive her.

Draining the water from the oversized tub, she watches the discolored liquid swirl down the drain. It feels worse than decadent to be in this luxury, knowing that the people who provide all the labor are crowded into the old ballroom of the place, sleeping on bunks, cots, and pallets in conditions she wouldn’t wish on a medieval serf. Negan let her wander among those kneeling people, seeming pleased as she stopped to examine them at random.

She isn’t a doctor like her sister or a nurse like her mother, but no Hilltop runner leaves the walls without at least passing Emmett Carson’s medic training. She recognizes the signs of nutritional deficits in all the workers, signs that don’t exist in the foot soldiers or ranking Saviors. It was all she could do not to put a fist in Negan’s grinning face when she spotted the bleeding gums on most of the twenty-one small children huddled among their parents.

There’s no fucking reason on this planet for children to be suffering from _scurvy_.

Her tour isn’t enough to get a true feel for the dynamic here. The cult-like obedience the workers seem to have is frightening. Not one of them hesitated in dropping to their knees when the bastard entered that ballroom. All of them seem cowed, accepting this fate because they don’t have an alternative. How to offer them one they can trust is the issue Honey ponders as she refills the tub with hot water.

The foot soldiers are the wild cards. While they knelt and obediently chanted “I Am Negan”, it wasn’t as fluid. They have better quarters, not quite full privacy, but shared rooms within the three smaller buildings that made up the once more affordable rooms of the resort. But they have soft beds to sleep in, and not one of them showed signs of starvation, just a lack of discipline from the signs they fight when there isn’t a ranking Savior in the room.

The lieutenants will take time to comprehend. She already knows she can write off Simon. There’s something behind the man’s eyes, a sort of leashed feral nature, that tells her he thrives off this unbalanced world. Negan is actually a chain on the greater monster within his ranks, she thinks.

Honey is glad to see the little bastard that led the attack on her people isn’t a lieutenant, because it will make his punishment easier. Derek’s days are numbered, because he gave the order that aimed a gun at her little brother’s head. She might not even have to kill him herself, because the attack on her group wasn’t sanctioned by Negan’s rules. After all, if everyone died in the coward’s ambush, Negan would have to keep searching for communities to support his own, and all they would have to show for the attack would be three truckloads of produce.

Hearing the door to the suite open, she reaches for the knife the guards missed in her belt. Concealed as an ornate handle, few would understand what it is. Eugene outdid himself in crafting it to look like a carved buckle, the delicately etched honeybees belying that they support a two inch dagger capable of punching into any soft and vulnerable point on the body. It’s not the only thing they missed other than her garotte.

“Put the fucking tray on the table and get out.”

Negan’s voice, obviously ordering some underling around. Honey slides the dagger back into the leather of her belt. It won’t be needed, even if it would be easy enough to take him out and flee out the window. No one expects a woman to climb the outside of a four story building. Danny would appreciate the use of the skill he taught her, and she can almost feel the young Marine’s ghost lingering, but it’s not time. Not yet.

“Well, isn’t this a goddamned _stunning_ display of womanly flesh.”

Leveling her best ‘don’t be a dumbass’ stare at the man standing in the doorway to the bathroom, she wraps the chain for the tub’s stopper around her toes and pulls it loose. Not waiting for the water to drain away, she steps onto the mat, reaching for one of the soft towels a worker scurried in here with earlier along with the other bath supplies.

“You prefer your women black and blue?” Honey queries, taking care not to put too much pressure on the bruised areas. Her ribs aren’t the only sensitive area from the outnumbered fight she eventually lost.

The asshole actually looks affronted at the implication. “Hell no, Gorgeous. I told you that sort of thing is fucking forbidden here.”

It fits with her assessment that he likes to pretend to be something other than the monster he is. “I have a name, you know.”

“One you haven’t seen fit to fucking share with me yet.”

Honey spares a moment to wonder if Negan is addicted to his profanity. She doesn’t think she’s heard more than a sentence or three without some variation of fuck out of him. Considering giving out something other than her name, considering the bland nature of the legal name and the possibly simpering implications of her chosen one, she wraps her hair into a towel. “It’s Honey.”

“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me. Honey? I know you’ve got the deep south accent and all, Gorgeous, but that’s just damned hilarious.”

She just arches a brow at him as she retrieves her belt from the pile of ruined clothing. If he forgets that honey is a weapon as well as a sweet, that’s his own mistake to make. When she moves toward the door, Negan actually steps back, continuing his delusion that there’s a choice to be made here between them. While she’s comfortable in her own skin, the meal on the table is for two, and this is not a negotiation she’s holding bare ass naked.

“My given name is Hannah,” she concedes, pulling on the clothes that came from some masculine stash here. Honey is used to adapting clothing, with her height meaning that scavenged women’s clothing rarely fits, and her belt cinches up the extra waistline easily. Someone in their supplies has a sense of humor. Even the underwear is masculine, and they didn’t provide a bra. That’s fine, since she rinsed hers out in the bathroom and left it there to dry. She wouldn’t let the specially crafted garment far away from her willingly anyway.

“I suppose I can understand rejecting that one. That’s a fucking boring moniker indeed.” He follows as she inspects the tray on the table, which is set up just like it’s room service for the resort before the virus ran free.

The obvious implication of the meal for two isn’t lost on her, and she uncovers both plates, setting the table just as she would if the world were still normal outside this room. Negan drapes himself into a chair, reaching for a roasted potato with his fingers and popping it into his mouth, watching her with those clever, hazel eyes and smiling lazily. Taking the seat opposite him, she tries her own meal, recognizing the signs of a cook trying desperately to make do with mismatched and irregular supplies.

“You come to a decision yet, _Honey_?” he drawls. 

The emphasis on her name zips along her nerve endings, but probably not in the same effect he intends because her gut roils instinctively from this man. The tone is seductive, and so is his body language. She can admit he makes a pretty picture, probably old enough to be her father but still in good shape with wide shoulders and handsome features. The problem is that Honey already knows what lies beneath the surface of the charming miscreant he’s presenting to her right now. In his own way, Negan is as much a chameleon as she is.

“I am no man’s possession.”

“Is that how you see my wives? Possessions?”

“I could call them something less polite.” He’ll assume that to be whores, because he’s that type of man. She sees them as victims of a world they were never given the ability to survive in. Honey is well aware of the privilege her family gave her to be who she is today.

“They choose not to work for a fucking living. Any of them can choose otherwise at any goddamned time they like.” He’s offended, charm fading away in what she thinks might be actual hurt feelings.

Back to that overcrowded room where people starve while those like her and Negan have full plates of food - like that’s a true choice. None of the trio are soldiers, so that’s the only option they face. Starvation or turning their body over to the man who rules their world like a medieval king in ways gentlemanly Ezekiel would never stoop to.

“I have far more value to you than holing up in a room waiting for you to decide you want more company than your own right hand.”

Negan laughs, a booming sound that fills the room. “Holy shit, do you fucking ever.” Reaching out to the bottle of bourbon that came with the tray, he pours a measure into each of their glasses. “You could return to that boring little village with its crops and shitty living and keep them in line for my lieutenants to visit, if you insist. My patrols will keep the place safe and sound from the dead pricks roaming the land.”

“I could.” Honey cups the glass, scenting the amber liquid before savoring a drink. The alcohol burns along her throat, providing the first burst of impending pain relief she’s had in days. She does believe that he _thinks_ he would set her free to live with her people, so long as she honors the agreement to supply his own. But she recognizes when a man is intrigued by a woman, and his attentions won’t stray easily, she suspects.

“Or you could prove yourself worthy of a spot among my lieutenants.” 

Ah, there it is. That bait, set out there to draw her in. She wonders how often he’s been refused, even without the threat of the bat leaned against the bedside table four feet away. Charm can be a deadly weapon in its own right, and Negan has a dangerous wealth of it.

“Not a foot soldier?”

“Come on, Honey, we both know you’re no common fighter to follow orders. You’re no more capable of bowing your head and listening to Simon or Regina than I am.”

It’s funny that Negan recognizes that much about her, yet still offers her power. “And they’re going to accept me just being promoted to stand beside them?”

“Oh, yes, they will, because they have no fucking other choice.” Negan sets the glass down on the table, leaning forward. His gaze is intense, voice dropping low. “My word is the final goddamned word here. They disobey that, and they’ll serve the Sanctuary on the fence.”

Among Honey’s allies, that phrase would mean a demotion to scut work among the guards or workers. Here? Negan took delight in showing her the walker covered fence that serves as a warning to the residents and a deterrent to the roving dead outside.

She doesn’t answer right away, although they both know she’s understood the choice he was going to offer. The well appointed room with all its old world insulation from the reality outside is proof that he is dangling even more than a lieutenant spot here. Not even Simon, the only one who doesn’t kneel to Negan, has rooms on this floor.

It’s not just that she’s a woman, because there are three other women introduced as lieutenants. It wouldn’t surprise her that he’s bedded one or more of them at some point, either out of curiosity, boredom, or sheer horniness, but just like the carefully isolated wives, they didn’t hold his interest. She doubts she would in the long term either. A man like this isn’t capable of that depth of feeling anymore. Whether he was always this way, or the Outbreak shattered him like it did so many others, Honey doesn’t know.

Her plate is half cleared, and Negan’s picked at his food and spent more time with the bottle of bourbon than he ought when she finally deigns to answer him.

“I pick my own soldiers.” She leans over to pluck the bottle from his fingers, dragging her own fingertips against his knuckles as she does so. His intake of breath is unmistakable, and his hazel eyes go heavy lidded as she refills her own glass and takes a drink.

“Granted. Anything else?”

“Once I’ve earned my place? I want the workers.”

“Why the fucking drudges?”

“Because whoever is responsible for them is wasting your best resource.” Negan called them that himself, even if he was derogatory in how he views those who can’t fight. “And I refuse to work for a man who is so foolish as to let his kingdom rot from within.”

“An army marches on its stomach,” he replies, surprisingly with no added profanity. When she arches a brow, he shrugs. “I was educated once upon a time. Napoleon’s soldiers destroyed their own supply lines for retreat.”

“Then you should understand that without those workers, your soldiers are incapable of surviving a single winter, even this far south. They’re locusts.” It’s a gamble, what she’s doing here, but being a warrior will only sway so many to her side. She needs the people that Negan doesn’t value, because right now, she can win their loyalty with simple human decency.

“Show me the plan, and then we’ll talk.”

It’s not a no. This is a risk both ways, because the man’s highly intelligent, and more than that, he’s clever in ways she might not be able to predict or outthink all on her own.

Honey finishes the bourbon in her glass and rises, watching as he doesn’t entirely relax when she’s standing over him. Smart man. That bat may be out of reach, but she doesn’t doubt he’s got weapons secreted on his person the same way she does. Leaning in and bracing her palms on the arms of his chair, she brings her face in close to his, letting her breath ghost across his lips.

His eyes are a brilliant shade of hazel, thickly lashed, and she allows a slight smile. “That other thing you want from me?”

“Yeah?” His pupils are blowing wide, and she wonders if he understands the web she’s weaving. Strangely, she thinks he does comprehend the danger lurking over him right now, and that makes it even more alluring to play this game with her.

“Earn it.”

He allows her to walk away, to refill her glass, and to step through the sliding doors to the balcony. As she guessed, he doesn’t follow. She gives it a full minute before she looks back into the room.

Negan is standing now, rolling that bat in his hands and watching where her body is lit from behind by the setting sun. The bastard actually bows, so she salutes him with her glass. Returning to the scenery beyond her well appointed prison room, she hears the suite’s door shut behind her.

Alone on the balcony, it is the first time she allows herself to think of Eugene, holding the thought of her partner at bay until the bait is offered and the hook set. She doesn’t fear he’ll reject her for what she’s doing here, because she knows his love for her is as unshakable as her own for him. They’ve never vowed monogamy, keeping their relationship open to feeding both her need for exhibitionism and his need to watch. But she’s never once had sex without him in the same room, his consent evident in his enthusiastic voyuerism. 

Downing the remainder of the glass, she pitches it toward the river, sinking to her knees and leaning against the balcony rails. The desperate need for her other half to be here, helping in this effort to overthrow a madman and save the innocents under his thrall, eats through her like acid. It’s worse than the grief that flickers around the edges of her consciousness, as if half of everything she is lies out of reach with miles of countryside between them.

Leaning against the wrought iron and feeling it bite into bruised skin, Honey prays that somehow, she won’t do this alone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wrote two other versions of this using Negan's POV and it _sucked_ like a damn vortex. It finally occurred to me that I was using the wrong viewpoint, and once Honey took over, it ended up longer than most recent chapters.
> 
> Trivia point: Honey is the only of the original four Merle offspring that has never had a POV scene.
> 
> If you don't recall the chapter in RBM where Eugene finally confessed his voyeurism to Honey, this is a reflection that they did indeed move forward with the agreement that they weren't going to be strictly monogamous.
> 
> The resort is entirely imaginary, but if you need a mental map, it's near the bridge at Williamsport, Maryland. The Kingdom is near Atoka, VA. Hilltop is at Culpeper, VA. Alexandria is south of Woodbridge, VA, and Solomons is technically in Maryland on Solomons Island. http:// darktidings. atwebpages. com/ homestead_locales.html (remove spaces) for an update on each community as of May 2017.


	8. Make Someone Pay

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Logan wakes, helping focus the search for Honey, but faces challenges from his injuries that set his family to considering changes.

May 29, 2010

>-< Carol >-<

It would figure that the second Carol leaves the infirmary to shower upstairs is the moment when her injured son finally wakes. The yelling from the stairs is something she can hear even over the shower. Luckily, it's Scout that came to fetch her, since she steps right out of the shower even as her daughter is relaying the news.

Toweling off isn't anything thorough, and she just skips underclothing entirely. Shimmying her still damp body into jeans and a shirt, she follows Scout down the stairs. The sight she sees is the best one since the nightmare began: Logan's confused green eyes blinking up at Cricket as she runs through a neuro exam.

"Logan? Mama is here," Cricket says, but the confusion doesn't clear. His eyes track to Cricket, but he doesn't look at Carol at all.

"Sweetheart? Can you speak?" Carol asks, her heart sinking when Logan doesn't respond.

"Can you trade sides with me?" Cricket requests, expression solemn. "Logan, Mama is going to come to this side of the bed."

As soon as Carol comes into view on her son's left side, his expression shifts, and he fights to speak. It's garbled at first, but then, clearly, "Honey."

"We haven't found her." Four days missing, and their teams have put down walker after walker in an increasing grid of search. None were her daughter.

Logan frowns, squeezing Carol's hand painfully when she takes his. "Taken."

That single word makes her blood turn to ice. Carol turns to Scout, seeing those pale blue eyes narrow. She eases close to Carol. "Did you see who attacked, che'lu?"

"Dark men." He frowns, wincing as the motion tugs on the damage to the left side of his head. "Dark clothes… uh… cowhide."

"Leather?" Scout asks, tone sweet and gentle.

"Leather. Killed men. Taken." Logan sobs softly. "Danny."

His oldest sister slips around Carol to gently stroke Logan's uninjured right cheek. "I know, baby brother. We'll find them, and they'll pay for that."

By now, there are others slipping into the room, and Carol catches Shane mouthing for 'direction?'. The others were found where the road went in four directions. Their best trackers haven't found anything on the ground to indicate direction, but they didn't expect to. With the trucks missing, obviously the attackers stayed on the weather rough remaining pavement.

"Logan? Did you see what direction they left in?" Carol inquires, patting her free hand along his forearm.

It takes a minute for Logan to process either the question or the response. "Capitol."

That's what they need to know, a better direction than all four of them. Scout leans in and presses a kiss to his cheek. "You are amazing, kiddo. You get better while we find Honey."

Then she's gone, dragging many of the onlookers with her on a single stern glance. Carol feels a chair slide in behind her, and she sits, glancing up to see Merle. They both soothe Logan until he falls back asleep. Once that happens, Carol switches out with Sophia, letting their daughter watch over the younger sibling.

Gathering at the end of the small infirmary, they watch Cricket finish her radio consultation. The young doctor looks distressed, and not for the first time, Carol wishes a damned neurologist survived the outbreak. Emmett saved Logan's life, working alongside Cricket and Carol, but the injuries to the teen's torso were the elder Dr. Carson's specialty.

"We think he has damage to the left parietal lobe, based on the complete lack of any awareness of the right side of his body. He isn't paralyzed and moves his limbs, but there's no sensation or awareness that half his body even exists."

Carol's mind races, trying to remember the parietal lobes' function. With so little ability to heal it, she isn't as familiar. "It's the connector part of the brain right?"

"Sort of. It processes touch, pressure, pain, and spatial perception. But it plays a part in visual processing as well. With the left side damaged, he just doesn't know there are two halves of his body anymore. I'll need more testing to determine how bad it is, once he's not so tired or distressed."

"Is that what is affecting his speech?" Merle's voice sounds bleak, reminding Carol this isn't the first time he's dealt with a brain injured child.

"Possibly. But left lobe parietal damage should affect speech more. Denise suggested possible frontal lobe involvement. We'll need to wait and see if the speech problem is expressive aphasia or something worse."

"Once you find out if he can read and write," Merle clarifies, expression haggard. The last few days are the first time she's ever thought her husband looked his fifty-plus years.

Cricket smiles sadly. "Yes. And whether or not he remembers how to do math, tell right from left, and follow directions. Every physician we have is researching, Daddy, I promise you that."

Merle pulls Cricket into a lingering hug, but lets her go back to Logan after a minute. Carol steps in for mutual comfort. "We'll fix this, Merle. And what can't be fixed, we'll work around it."

He presses a firm kiss against her temple. "We will. I'm gonna go join the search teams. Guard our boy well."

Carol just smiles grimly, patting her holster. "In every way."

>-< Jazz >-<

Jazz's team is south of Hilltop by the time Logan wakes and gives a direction to search. He pauses after hanging up the radio mike, frowning. It's late enough in the day that the southern searchers are supposed to meet up tomorrow at Alexandria to join in the renewed search with DC as the focus.

It's been years since all radio communication was done in Chamorro, but he's glad they kept up teaching it. Right now, only medical personnel are permitted English over the airwaves. Reminding himself to suggest they stick to the radio-email because three vehicles with their radios disappeared, he goes to relay the message.

It's a quiet caravan that returns. Despite the fact that these marauders took down three of their best teams, they're still searching in groups of twelve. But instead of cargo trucks and light body armor, now they look like Homestead did when they went to war with Woodbury.

The line of Humvees pulls into Hilltop, and he sees with gratitude that Paul's teams actually made it back first. Jazz goes through the standard procedures though even though his mind all but aches with the need to go see with his own two eyes that his husband is here. It is ironic, all the knowledge he has about human psychology that babbles in the back of his head about fear of loss.

His sister was the first one to ever discuss loss with him. Now Honey is somewhere unknown, probably captive, and considering she killed at least two of the attackers based on the karambit wounds, probably being tortured or punished. The idea makes his skin crawl, touch sensitivity firing in ways it hasn't in years.

That's not just about Honey, though. Logan is his brother and his apprentice, and now, at only seventeen, he may face limitations that make Jazz's own look simple. 

Once he's certain everything is in order, Jazz goes looking for Paul and their son. It doesn't surprise him to find his husband already home, with MJ curled against his chest. At two, the toddler doesn't understand why his favorite aunt is missing or why everyone is so distraught and out of sorts.

MJ just tries to fix things the only way he knows how: clinging hugs and wet kisses.

Sitting next to Paul, Jazz drags both of them into his arms, glad that his sheer size makes it feasible and easy. He wishes protecting them from the dangers of the world was as possible.

"We'll find her," Paul says softly. "And as horrible as kidnapped sounds, it means they wanted her alive for some reason, so that's hopeful. It's Honey. Give her an inch, and she'll take the entire continent, you know that."

His husband loves Honey as fiercely as Jazz does, and Paul's words are accurate. The only sibling worse for them to snatch up would be Scout and her formal military training. Honey may not have gone to Parris Island and donned a Marine uniform officially, but between Scout, Tim, and Abraham, she's as prepared as any of the former military to be captured.

"Might find her in charge of the bandits by the time we get there," Jazz replies, trying for light hearted. If the group are scared strangers, maybe. Not if it's the madman from New York that everyone fears it is. "We need to send for the Oceanside leaders."

The group of women and children claimed asylum with the Allied Communities and took the offer of settlement further south in Georgia did so with obvious relief. But he knows the two women leaders might be useful here, because no matter how much detail a person thinks they write down, things get missed. Jazz needs to talk to them himself.

"The two leaders are at Tybee, right?"

"Yeah. I'll radio Beth after supper. If they sail the coast, it'll be faster than the roads."

There are reasons for boats and trains transporting long distance supplies now. While they do what they can to keep the roads passable, the Southern climate still grinds its way through what no longer has thousands of laborers and specialized equipment to keep in good repair.

The only vehicles they run anymore are modified to handle what's essentially offroading half the time they travel. In Georgia, they've begun projects to run parallel roadways safe for horse, mule, and water buffalo pulled wagons. By the time MJ is grown, Jazz thinks most of the paved latticework of roads from before the Outbreak will be memories, only the decaying concrete structures of the interstates remaining visible but unpassable.

MJ raises his head up, blinking sleepily. His blue eyes are pure Paul, a deeper and more vivid blue than Jazz's paler eyes. He reaches out to smooth the wild black curls, letting the way his son leans into the contact be a bandage to the grief and outrage boiling in the back of his mind.

High emotion isn't going to help find his sister or settle justice for the eleven dead and Logan's devastating injuries.

"How was Eugene today?"

Honey's husband in everything but official name seems like Jazz would be if Paul were missing… like half of himself is gone. Already often distractable and loquacious, those traits amplify when he is in distress like he is now.

"Oddly focused today. I know I worried about him leading his field team, but Honey chose well for who responds to him as a team leader."

"He's trained alongside her for years. It's a sort of mental muscle memory at this point, I think."

Paul thinks that over and nods, his hair catching against Jazz's beard. A couple of days of foregoing trimming it to the neat form he prefers, and he's halfway to the full beard Paul sports, it seems like. The scampering odd thought reminds Jazz that Eugene isn't the only one whose mind pinballs around under stress.

"Mama is going to want to take Logan home with her, once we find Honey." Focusing takes an act of firm mental effort.

"I can't blame her, but he may not want to go if Honey stays here."

Officially, Logan's adoption to Jazz's parents makes him a sibling, but the reality is that if Paul and Honey were older when they found him, he would probably be Jazz's nephew/adopted son instead. No one was surprised in the least when he chose Hilltop for his apprenticeship.

"She may go too." They have no idea what Honey will be coping with. Even if it's only losing her teams, that is going to rip her to shreds. Her people are her responsibility, and she's a Dixon. They take that seriously.

"Then we pack up and follow." 

The confident statement strikes a chord with Jazz. Hilltop will function easily without them, easily electing another council member to replace Jazz. The veterinarian at the Kingdom is capable of covering both there and Hilltop. 

"Of course we will."

Despite the confidence of planning for a future with Honey back and helping Logan, when he goes down the hall to the bathroom, Jazz finds himself eyeing the ladder to the loft bedroom. He makes the climb, observing the typical teenage maleness of Logan's quarters and feeling his chest burn molten hot with rage and grief.

How fucking dare these bastards kill their people, take Danny from them forever, and ruin a brilliant teenager's promising life? Honey is strong and an adult leader who knew the chances her profession entailed. Somehow, he knows she'll survive this.

But Logan? He's still a kid in many ways, in no rush for adulthood the way the teens Jazz's age grew up too hard and fast during the Outbreak. Jazz wanted him to have those last years of careless happiness.

Now they're gone, and all he can do is join the hunt to make someone pay for it.

>-< Eugene >-<

Eugene makes his escape from well-meaning Hilltoppers as soon as he can. Where they have an innate need to congregate and comfort each other, he needs time alone to try to come to terms with another day of fruitless searching. It's worse today, because now they suspect the Hilltop searchers were headed in the wrong direction.

Logan's head injury is something Eugene normally would bury himself in researching, joining the dozen or so physicians trying to find a solution to improve the boy's miraculous survival. But he knows better than to try to research when this restless energy crawls beneath his skin. It feels like an addict's withdrawals, and he regrets youthful bitchiness in thinking that addicts needed to set their mind to recovering.

Does it really matter that his addiction is six feet tall and covered in tattoos and piercings instead of a powder or pill?

That train of thought leads him to the bottle on the kitchen island, reminding himself that the anxiety medication Harlan's assistant gave him is just a temporary fix but absolutely needed. Once Honey is returned to her rightful place in the world, he won't need the assistance. He never has, since she came into his life.

"Abigail?"

His apprentice doesn't respond, so he takes the time to climb the stairs. Abby's room is empty, and he realizes Augustus is nowhere to be seen either. They said she asked to go home, and her disappearing is worrying. He remembers that farewell kiss to Danny, and Abby's always been closest to Honey of all her extended family. It's a double whammy for the seventeen year old.

Looking out her bedroom window across the backyard, which covers a half acre between the cottage and the original timber exterior wall for Hilltop, Eugene sees that the greenhouse door is ajar. Considering his own habit of seeking solace among the plants lately, he heads outside. Opening the door wider, he finds Abby more by seeing Augustus's aged frame standing guard as actually seeing the blonde.

"Abigail?"

The answer is the girl not muffling her tears, so he ventures inside. Had she requested to be alone, he would have respected that request. She's been his apprentice for a year, and he knows that despite the lack of biological ties, Abby is independent Dixon through and through normally.

Eugene finds her huddled on the wicker glider loveseat, arms folded around her knees as she cries quietly. Taking the seat beside her, he sets the thing to rock, hoping the repetitive motion soothes her the way it does him.

Augustus whines and drops his big head on Eugene's knee, letting the gliding motion rock him, too. He thinks if the dog were any smaller, he would crawl into Eugene's lap.

"Did you hear Logan woke up?" he asks, keeping his voice carefully soft and even.

She shakes her head, wiping her eyes. "No. Is he going to be okay?"

The teens grew up together, bright little blondes among the wealth of dark haired Dixons. Even as apprentices, they stand out here at Hilltop, natural leaders with their ease with people that Eugene sometimes envies. It makes the news especially hard, trying to consider the challenges Logan will face.

"He'll live, but they think there was some damage to his brain from the head wound."

Abby straightens, coming into intense focus on Eugene. "How bad? My dad had brain damage once, you know. He got better."

Considering the legacy Daryl still has from that injury, Eugene feels both hopeful and not. "They aren't sure yet. Speech is affected and more, but he isn't paralyzed, at least."

She thinks it over. "Could I go to Alexandria?"

If it was entirely up to Eugene, she would already be there. It was Daryl's request that kept Abby in the better security of Hilltop. "I'll ask. They may move him, now that he's awake."

Probably not as far as Georgia yet, but Solomons' research facilities are more remote and secure than Alexandria with Logan indicating DC as the area of interest. He doesn't add that it doesn't feel like he has the final decision, even though technically during her apprenticeship, he's supposed to. No sane man would invoke that clause with Daryl right now.

"I need to tell you something. Was going to tell you soon, anyway." She falls silent though, looking miserable. "Was going to have to leave my apprenticeship."

It's a distraction from the aching absence of Honey, at least. "Why?"

Abby clears her throat. "I'm pregnant. Dr. Carson says nine weeks in."

Jesus, poor kid. No wonder Danny's death is gutting her. As much as they've tried to keep pace with contraceptives, some they can't recreate. Others are unreliable from age, and whatever Abby utilized was between her and Honey and probably Lori.

"Being pregnant wouldn't stop the apprenticeship, unless you just want it to. We have plenty of things to cover that would be pregnancy safe." That's actually an area he's sure about, because they've made those assessments before. Technically, there's only seven more months on Abby's apprenticeship, since she waited a few months past her birthday to travel north.

"Really?" She sounds so damned hopeful. "Even having a baby in the house?"

"I have no problem having a baby in the house, and neither would Honey."

Abby sniffles just a little. "I thought maybe, because y'all don't have kids…"

Eugene manages a smile he hopes reassures her. "That doesn't mean we don't like babies around, Abby, just because we don't choose to have them ourselves."

Honey honors his continued wish not to risk his own genetics being passed on. While he's been open to her having all the babies she likes, and finding a donor would be easy enough, when the subject arises, she's always said she's young enough yet not to worry about it. It's true enough, since she won't be twenty-five until July.

He strongly suspects she likes the freedom of borrowing MJ or Olivia's children (or both) to spoil and send home. It is the best of both worlds in his eyes, at least.

"Mama will want me to come home." 

That's true enough. Lori is going to want her pregnant daughter close by and under Cricket's care. But Abby's over sixteen, so in the end, it's her choice. 

"If that's what you decide is best, then we'll figure out how we continue your training. Sophia can help with a lot of it, and you know Merle knows more than enough, even if he doesn't deem himself an engineer." Sophia was his first Dixon apprentice, because he doesn't count teaching Honey anything she asked. Eugene is confident that the older blonde can finish her cousin's training.

"I guess so." Abby reaches out to hug him, and she's family, so it doesn't make him edge away. They rock for a while, his feet pushing the glider. "I miss Honey."

That jolts the aching pain back to the surface, flipping his emotions hard. But Eugene takes a deep breath, reminding himself that legally adult or not, Abby is still enough of a child to need even his weak comfort. "Me too."

It seems to be all she needs. They both stay in the greenhouse full of the plants he coaxes to live in foreign climates, breathing in the scent of the literal tea garden and letting it remind them of the missing piece that he built it for in the first place. Augustus, old years beyond the norm for his breed, watches Eugene with mournful, trusting eyes.

Honey will be found. Eugene refuses to believe anything else where the other half of his soul is concerned.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There are therapies to help Logan's issues, but no actual full cure. He'll always have some perception loss of that side of his body. The concern about reading, math, and left/right is due to Gerstmann’s syndrome which can occur with damage to thr dominant parietal lobe.
> 
> The speech issues will recover better. Ironically, music therapy can help expressive aphasia, because singing is on the other side of the brain versus speech.


	9. Free Will

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Honey's first raid as a Savior Lieutenant goes well, prompting her to escalate other plans for infiltrating the Saviors further.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Negan chapter, folks, and most is not really Negan Warning Zone until Negan finds Honey after the raid. Eugene's scene should be clear.
> 
> Summary at the end, as the Negan and Honey scenes do contain potential triggery content. Sex scenes aren't graphic (ugh no!), but do occur.

**May 31, 2017**

>-< Negan >-<

Four days after Negan retrieved his latest lieutenant from a prison cell, she leads her first raid outside the wall. It's obvious right away that Honey is familiar with the area in a way his people aren't. He waits, Gavin to one side and Simon to the other, as Honey's handpicked team of foot soldiers swarm into the old warehouse store like ants on carrion.

"She's military," Gavin observes, watching intently. 

Negan turns to look at him, since the Saviors following Honey are out of sight. "You sure of that? She doesn't seem fucking old enough."

The other man nods. "I think she's older than she appears, but either way, she's not pretending like some do. My brother was a Marine. It's hard to miss."

Negan thinks about the young woman going through martial art forms in the courtyard and holding mock fights to select her foot soldiers from those the others don't mind losing. Honey doesn't let the rib injury slow her down, obviously used to working through pain or injury. Her fighting style is dirty as hell, nothing like the silly forms they teach in dojos. It makes Gavin's idea take root, because a female Marine would have to bust her fucking non-existent balls to succeed.

"Relies on the blade more than a gun," Simon observes. There's a yearning quality to his voice that would make Negan consider taking Lucille to the bastard except it's not a sexual attraction his chief lieutenant is exhibiting. It falls a lot closer to that darkness in Negan's own soul reaching toward something similar and preening at no longer being alone.

Simon's delight in carnage makes him a damned terrifying warning to Negan's own people. Any community back home that balked at fulfilling their duties met with Simon's punishment as often as Negan's. His admiration for the up close knife work is just what the little bastard thrives on, getting the warmth of one's kill right on the skin. Negan doesn't think Honey is that far gone, not yet.

It takes close to an hour for the thirty soldiers to emerge from the cavernous building. Some throw open the bay doors once used for delivery. Honey drops to the ground, striding forward to meet them with a grim smile.

"Gonna need more trucks than we brought. Place is still untouched for the most part."

Negan eyes her gore splattered clothes, reminding himself again just how fucking alluring seeing her work with a knife was. "How about you tell me why your people never raided this fucking place?"

"Scheduled it for this summer," she replies impassively, cleaning her knife carefully with a ratty bandana. "This is on the outer band of our range, and we grow most of what we need. Raid like this? Canned goods are quirky from years of temperature changes."

"So what exactly would you be after?" 

"Salt, sugar, spices. Some miss coffee enough to brave stuff this old. Paper goods. Medication. Automotive section is usually good, too." She eyes what's being loaded by her soldiers in the trucks backed up by Simon's men. "Clothing and bedding. Easier to repurpose ready made than to start from scratch. Cotton is a waste of good crop land with this surplus around."

Something in how things are being loaded pisses her off, and Honey is gone before Negan replies. He rubs at the growth of beard he's sporting and considers the information she just shared. The fact that the soldiers she's only just taken command of jump to her orders like his own is a little flattering. Negan did tell her that his word was law.

"Enough bounty in crops to leave places like this sit?" Simon grumbles, sounding pissed. "She's got to be fucking lying."

"Climate is better here. Longer growing season. They grow enough to spare for biofuel, because that wasn't rancid oil those trucks were running." Gavin shifts his weight, glancing at Negan. "How long are you going to wait?"

"She'll give me a goddamned deadline for seeking out her people tonight." Negan doesn't need to add the 'or else'. These two men know it's there.

Later, when he finally tracks her down in her quarters, she's lounging on the balcony and freshly bathed. Given a choice, he notices she's got a bottle of vodka on her table, which means the glass in her hands isn't water. Alert as alway, she looks up, staring at him as she takes a drink.

He hooks a finger, summoning her. Watching as she straightens from her slouch against the railing with a languid grace that reminds him of a fucking cat, Negan still feels that flicker of intense interest beneath his skin he's had for days. 

"Guess you didn't appreciate the fucking show," he drawls. It was a test, he supposes, summoning her earlier as Amber was in his rooms. But taunting her by having her arrive while he was balls deep didn't seem to sway her. Damned minx just helped herself to a glass of his whiskey and watched cynically as if critiquing his technique in bed and finding him lacking.

"Never saw the appeal of watching a grown man fuck a blow up doll." She drops her glass onto the table with a thunk and fiddles with the bottle. Through the thin fabric of the man's undershirt she's wearing, he can see the indistinct shape of her nipple and belly button piercings.

When his gaze reaches her face again, she's watching him with that same hazy boredom she watched as he screwed his wife. Amber appeals occasionally because she doesn't feel like a damned prostitute, even if he knows there's little truth in her claims to enjoy his company. This afternoon? Spilling inside her took imagining a very different scenario. "You think you could do better?"

"With that scrap of a woman? I could. You fantasizing about two women fucking like every other man on the planet?"

Negan can't deny the thought crossed his mind when he asked. There's not a fucking doubt in his mind that any of his trio of wives would put on a show if he demanded it. Hell, if it weren't for the plaintive looks Amber still gives that boyfriend of hers, he almost would think his youngest wife is a lesbian anyway.

"And if I was? What's your price for me to earn that fucking show?" Laughing at his pun, he snatches away her vodka bottle and deliberately drinks from it, ignoring the glasses.

Instead of an immediate fuck off answer, Honey purses her lips before smiling slyly. "Maybe I want to keep her."

Did he guess the wrong damned woman as lesbian? It would explain her lack of real interest in his offer. Negan scoffs, setting the vodka down. "What would you want with a goddamn wife?"

Honey laughs softly. "Same thing you would, darlin', except I don't put my toys away until I'm bored enough to play with them."

Despite her referring to Amber as a blow up doll, Negan is intrigued enough to consider it. While none of his lieutenants are married, Simon keeps a mistress in his quarters and Regina goes through a cycle of men from the drudges that never last more than a month. The men don't seem to mind a few weeks off hard labor.

In the end, Negan shrugs, reaching out to tug the end of her long braid. He's tired of Amber and her shitty playacting at being a wife, and this way? There's no reneging on the deal he made the boring ass woman. "If she's willing, you're welcome to her. Free of charge, no porn show required. Doing me a fucking favor."

Honey's smile is delighted, as if he really is handing her a gift. Catching his hand, she strokes fingertips along his palm and wrist. For something fucking chaste, it jolts right to his groin. Despite his earlier release, it feels like it's been months since anything felt better than jerking off.

"How is that earning going, Gorgeous? You made up your damned mind about me yet?" She agreed to show him her home tomorrow while Amber was dressing earlier, pale gaze following the other woman as she ignored his nude form. A superstitious part of him thinks if he doesn't get to fuck her tonight, it may never happen.

It's funny. Negan expected her to toy with him further, especially after the undercurrent of boredom in his bedroom earlier. Instead, Honey grips his lapels and gives him a kiss filthy enough to make him realize just how goddamned mundane bedding Amber was.

By the time she has him naked on the bed, her body arched above him to display the ink all over her skin, he knows he's addicted. Holy shit, he's fucking keeping her. Somehow, some way, she can never fucking leave him. Negan hasn't felt this goddamn alive since Lucille died.

>-< Honey >-<

Honey actually didn't expect Negan to stick around once he got what he wanted from her. Having him sprawl next to her requires more self control to stay relaxed than actually having sex with him did. Sex is different from the intimacy implied by lying next to each other in bed.

When his calloused fingers drag across the faintest of stretch marks on her lower belly, she makes sure opening her eyes is a lazy, indolent action. Arching a brow, she stares back at him. Him being interested in her tattoos or piercings, she understands. Not that smallest of natural alteration of her skin.

"There a rugrat gonna come screaming for its missing mama tomorrow?"

Honey can't help laughing. "Not damn likely." Even if she was a mother, she can't imagine anyone letting her child run into the unknown tomorrow's meeting will entail. 

When he rolls the skin between his fingers, almost pinching, she grabs his wrist. Her tweaking the nerve makes Negan laugh and let go. "Touchy subject? What happen? Asshole ole man take your kid? That why you're so damned anti-wife?"

At least he doesn't go for a dead child, as much as that's a high risk in this world.

"Nothing so sordid. My brother wanted a kid." As much as she would like to hide the connection to MJ, the fewer secrets she seems to have, the less he will dig into what needs to go unsaid, like Danny and Logan's deaths meaning she's incapable of forgiving him for allowing such ravages under his rule.

That makes him raise up laughing. Amusement makes him look younger than he is, but she still thinks he's more acquainted with fifty than forty. "All those jokes about Southerners and incest are actually fucking true?"

"Don't be a dumbass. His husband is their son's biological father."

"You screwed your brother-in-law? Kinky as hell."

Honey decides not to bother correct the method of MJ's conception. It doesn't really matter if he thinks she slept with Paul, and the actual mechanics of the conception were almost as weird, for a man like this. Instead, she shrugs, stretching lazily.

It distracts him, exactly as she expected, bringing his attention to metal and ink instead of the barely visible evidence of her nephew's months under her care. She hopes her family sent MJ south, far away from any fallout if her plan fails.

Progress was made today. She took her share of the raid in vitamins even the timid gal in charge of supplies didn't care to even log into her records. The mothers in the workroom understood their purpose, gazes on their poor children's malnourished forms as they accepted the bottles. It's a tiny beginning, turning the hearts and minds of the people against Negan, but the flame is lit.

She learned that much in her four days of nominal freedom. Lieutenants have the freedom to do just about anything they want with supplies they claim, and there's really no limit as long as she brings in bounties like today's. From things she's gleaned while training with Laura and Gavin, paying the drudges or even foot soldiers for favors or services is encouraged in their mimicry of the feudal system.

While Honey hadn't actually intended to fuck Negan tonight, the unexpected win on prying Amber free from her wifely duties needed a distraction so he doesn't think too hard on actually wanting a payment for the concession. The barely hidden misery on the girl's face this afternoon made Honey reconsider her plan not to slit Negan's throat right away. Instead, she hid her outrage under a mask of boredom while plotting different ways to make the man suffer before he dies.

Negan flicks the honeybee looped in her belly button. "Don't remember those in that cell when we met."

Considering the intent study he made of her bare torso, she imagines he would have noticed. The fact that none of her jewelry was taken should have told her his people were offering her up as a special sort of sacrifice. Luckily for them, the idea behind her kidnapping actually fits with her plans, and the puzzle medallion around her neck is a hidden blade just like the one in her belt. "Pocketed all my piercings while I was waiting in the dark."

"Smart." Negan traces them all, lingering on the dozen or so in her left ear. Honey hides a smile at the fact that every one of them is something Eugene crafted for her. They tell a story even more clearly than her tattoos.

"Gonna introduce me to this brother you love so fucking much you spawned a kid for him?" 

Honey meets those intrigued hazel eyes and shrugs away the fission of panic at the idea of Jazz being within a hundred miles of this bastard. "If he's home. You do understand they would probably be out looking for me."

Hell, making sure they don't encounter a military force she can't explain is going to be hard enough. She is a little surprised Negan would take a direct risk by going himself. His usual method is to send lieutenants to bear the brunt of first contact.

"That going to be a problem?" There's the dangerous part of him, going on alert. He's not stupid, and his men killed twelve of hers. It's already part of their deal that any violent first impressions needed are already dealt.

"Not as long as they know I'm deciding things of my own free will." Honey prays Ezekiel himself is home, because the best scenario is the king's flamboyant personality cueing off her signals. Jerry and Dianne are great leaders, but neither are actors.

Negan lays his hand flat over one of her hips, leaning in to nuzzle at her throat. If the situation were anything other than what it was, it would almost be sweet. "And it is your freely made choice, isn't it, Hannah?"

She loathes the name that few use other than Eugene spilling from his lips and wishes she never revealed it. Distracting him is easy, though, directing him to a kiss full of invitation meant to bury curiosity under arousal. There's a yearning note to his voice in that question that she'll explore later, when his eyes and hands aren't on her.

It is her free choice to stay with a monster and share his bed. The fact that it is one Negan is destined to regret is the part that makes it almost easy.

>-< Eugene >-<

Even being told to search around DC doesn't help, other than heighten the risk as they cross into areas that are still infested in horrific numbers. Years of regular forays into DC lessened some of the walker population, but realistically, clearing the capital city is impossible. Only the eventual decay of the dead beyond the virus's ability to renew will wipe the slate clean here.

Crossing back over the bridge and securing the passage so nothing unthinking can follow, he eyes his exhausted team. "I'm going to ask if we can pass the night hours at the Kingdom. Less travel, thus more time for everyone to obtain sufficient rest."

The gratitude on their tired faces makes him feel guilty. So many people are devoted to uncovering where Honey was taken against her will. It may yet prove a futile search. At first, after Logan woke, Eugene expected to get a radio summons that his other half won her way free and found her way home.

As each hour goes by, his hopes lessen, because he's read too much on the odds of survival in situations like this. It was a stupid stage, years ago before he ever thought he would have anyone important enough to miss. Those damned numbers won't stop running through his head, and the one person who could ever ease the chaos inside his mind is missing.

It doesn't surprise him that Jazz and Paul both agree to direct their teams to the Kingdom. Going home is a heartbreaking reminder of Honey's larger than life spot in their family being empty. With Abby at Alexandria under Carol's care and protection, Eugene doesn't even have to return home for her, either. MJ is with his grandmother, too, despite Alexandria not being as secure as Hilltop.

They could head to Alexandria, but the community already houses a significant number of the Georgia searchers. Facing Jazz and Paul is acceptable, because they don't look to him for miracles. Being among the rest of the family makes his skin crawl with the need to fix everything somehow for more than his own sake.

Nonr of his team require conversation as they pass through security into Ezekiel's Kingdom. Here, there are fewer expectations that Honey is just out of sight, and no one follows him when he hides away into a guest room without bothering to attend the supper provided for the weary search teams.

Snagging the bottle of meds from his backpack, Eugene seeks the oblivion only medication can bring him now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> After Honey's first foray as a Lieutenant goes well, Negan pushes her buttons by summoning her to him while he's in bed with Amber. It backfires in one way, as she tricks him into giving her Amber as a wife. To distract him from the trick, she finally sleeps with him.
> 
> This is the chapter that's the reason for the non-con flag on the story, for the remembrance Negan and Honey have of him in bed with Amber.
> 
> Trivia for those who skipped to summary: Honey was Paul and Jazz's surrogate for MJ.
> 
> This is gonna be hella tricky to clean up for FFnet without losing the important bits. Ugh.


	10. Alliance

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Honey brings Negan to the Kingdom to negotiate their new alliance with Ezekiel.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Negan has some POV, but it is actually very mild for Negan.

** June 1, 2017 **

>-< Negan >-<

As they turn off what was once a state highway onto a carefully graveled road winding into the countryside, Negan glances at Honey where she sits in the driver's seat. She seems eerily calm, neither excited nor upset to be approaching her home.

"It was a fancy, expensive as hell girl's boarding school before," she tells him. "Lots of housing in the dorms, which was important before we expanded the walls."

"Don't really need the fucking guided tour, Gorgeous. Just the pissant farmers to agree to what you say they will." The details bore the fuck out of him. That's why he has lieutenants.

Honey's grin is wolfish enough to make him sit up straight. "Two hundred protected acres is unimportant?"

"Two hundred? You got to be fucking kidding me." She has to be. No one has ever held that much land in the seven years since the world goddamn ended. 

"Nope." She fucking smirks at him, mischief evident in her expression. "I worked every summer it was legal in my daddy's construction firm before the world got fucked over. Security isn't all guns and fighting."

He needed the warning, Negan realizes, because what rears up in front of them when they clear a treeline feels like a fucking mirage. Ten foot walls, alternating timber logs like something out of a western war movie with iron bars that clash somewhere between prison bars and high class fencing. It would take a fucking tank to get through those walls, because he can see the stain on those timbers that he bets is flame retardant and not to make them pretty.

"Are you fucking playing me?" he growls out, hand clamping over the wrist closest hard enough to feel the bones grind. Negan has already broken his personal rules for this woman, intoxicated by the idea of her. He slept beside her last night, in her own bed, keeping her lean body tucked into his as if she would disappear into a puff of goddamn smoke if he didn't.

Honey arches a brow, eyeing his hand. Something dark flickers across her expression and makes him feel like he's grabbed ahold of a cobra. Negan isn't sure why he lets go, but when he does, that sense of danger fades.

Her smile is grim now, and she looks toward the compound they are still approaching. "This place is stagnant now. I've done all I can do, and now it's all maintenance."

The reasoning registers with him, and Negan guffaws, understanding. She's an adrenaline junkie, much like himself. Sitting behind walls, tame as a damned sheep, doesn't suit her at all. Honey has outgrown this backwater place that spawned her into the apocalyptic world.

"You can build these walls?" The possibility of a fucking fortress to secure his people dances through his head. "Recreate this?"

"With the right equipment, supplies, and motivated workers, yeah. Beauty of this world? We don't have to follow some bean counter's budget." The smirk is back as she pulls to a stop at a set of gates that looks like a mixture of gothic castle and Jurassic Park. Behind them, the rest of the caravan halts. 

It dawns for the first time why she asked for control of his drudges. She doesn't want control of the laundry, cooking, and how the toilets are cleaned. The woman wants hard labor out of those seemingly worthless mouths to feed.

She reaches for his arm, curling fingers around his bicep. Unlike his harsh grip earlier, hers seems meant to reassure. "It would probably be a good idea to stay in the truck for now. I didn't design those towers just to look pretty. My own protocol won't allow them to open the gate except by authority of someone who outranks me, and that's only one person."

It's the distraction she needs to keep him immobile, because Negan leans forward to inspect what looked like ornate supports for the massive gates. There's a flash of movement near the top of one as soon as Honey is boots on the ground. Deciding to humor her request, he lowers his window to listen.

"I need to see the king! Ask him to bring Shiva to the gate."

There's a guard on the ground now, emerging from the tower to the left. "You bringing friendlies, ma'am?" the man asks. He carries his rifle with ease, much like Honey handles one, but his dress falls somewhere between old west and renaissance fair. 

Honey glances back toward Negan and smiles. "An opportunity for our people."

The guard nods and raises his radio, making the summons she requested. Once the man steps back out of sight behind the tower, Honey strolls back toward the truck. Leaning through the passenger window, she strokes fingers along his inseam, looking almost bored.

"It'll take about ten minutes for the king to make it down here."

"King? Your esteemed fucking leader calls himself a king?" It amuses the hell out of Negan, just the pretentiousness of it. "Where do you stand with this king, if you can summon him so easily?"

She shrugs, still trailing those fingers and reminding him how they feel on bare skin. His body responds like a damned teenager to the touch. "He's my uncle."

The complete assurance she had in telling him her people would agree now makes complete fucking sense. As young as she is, to have such ranking in her community, of course it's goddamn nepotism. "Maybe I should call you princess?" he drawls, making her give him a sly, Cheshire Cat smile.

Negan likes the fucking irony of the name. It implies something sweet and in need of protection. Instead, she's as deadly and worldly as any knight. He doesn't care that they have an audience from those towers, dragging her in for a filthy kiss that promises more once the tedium of bureaucracy is done.

Her hand wanders enough to make him regret the long drive home, but even he isn't so distracted by his damned cock that he misses the grinding sound of the gates opening. Honey winks at him as she backs away from the truck to stride forward, gaze on the dozen people at the gate. But it isn't the flamboyantly dressed humans that catch his eye. 

It's the fucking tiger on a chain like the self-styled king is walking a goddamn yap dog.

>-< Honey >-<

"Uncle Ezekiel!"

"Hannah Catherine! Welcome home!"

When Ezekiel opens his arms wide, inviting a hug, Honey finally allows relief to settle into her mind. She wasn't entirely sure he would understand the request to revert to the man she first met, back when Shiva was his favored sidekick and not just his beloved aging pet. She's slightly taller than him, but it still feels so good to finally not feel alone in her plan that she allows herself a moment to bury her face against his shoulder and half voice a moment of sorrow.

His arms tighten around her, and she doesn't think anyone else hears it when he reassures her. "Whatever it is you need, it is yours, my friend."

Blinking to clear the sudden rush of tears that Ezekiel trusts her judgement this much, she finally lets him go after he kisses her cheek. They have an audience to impress.

Her heart sinks when she sees one of Ezekiel's leather armor clad guards is Jazz, bookending Ezekiel with Jerry for an impressive display of masculine bulk. She chances meeting his eyes. The pain there makes her flinch. "Trust me, che'lu, please."

Jazz blinks. "Always."

Reassured her brother will play along as long as he thinks she's safe, Honey greets Shiva. It's always a risk, petting the tiger like she is some sort of housecat, but Ezekiel wouldn't have her out if it wasn't a good day. The big cat allows the caress, chuffing contentedly.

"I met some allies while I was lost, uncle." She reluctantly stops touching Shiva's furry shoulders to indicate the vehicles outside the gate. "They've agreed to patrol our area for walkers if we supply their people with sufficient food."

The Kingdom has the food to spare, and Honey knows her parents will happily replace anything needed for the subterfuge if Ezekiel requests. No one here will suffer hunger for her plan to work. 

Ezekiel strokes his beard thoughtfully. "It would be quite a godsend to not risk our people in the wilderness when we have more pressing needs at home. The fields promise us a lush harvest this year, and we shall need all our able bodies to bring in the bounty. What payment have you negotiated?"

Thank God for Ezekiel's intelligence and adaptation. She points to the cargo trucks. "Two for fresh produce. Two for preserved foods. That's the initial payment. After that, two trucks of fresh per month until the end of harvest."

It's what she estimates will be required just to keep the Saviors alive, including the drudges, for the time she's working to secure enough loyalty to save the vulnerable. She doesn't intend for more than two future monthly payments to be made, but those children will not starve in the meantime. The irony is that they've supported a struggling community for free before. In a different scenario, there would be no need for the implied threat Negan seems to think is required.

"That sounds fair enough for such services." Ezekiel glides his hand along Shiva's back. "And for returning you safely to us. Perhaps that merits a greater reward than fruits and vegetables."

Encouraged that he's playing along even further, she smiles, pretending relief as she looks back to where Negan lurks in the truck. He's a hedonist, she knows. What will encourage him to believe the medieval kingdom even more?

"How did the latest brewing turn out?"

Laughing heartily, Ezekiel gestures toward the truck. "Have your friend join us. I would like to meet the man who promises such security in exchange for a well filled belly."

Negan obviously hears, stepping out of the truck. His leather jacket contrasts with the rich velvet of Ezekiel's robe, and she's surprised he left the bat in the truck. His stride is cocksure, but she sees the tension in his shoulders as he comes within range of the tiger.

"Uncle Ezekiel, this is Negan, the leader of the Saviors. Negan, this is King Ezekiel. Our home is known simply as the Kingdom." Both men exchange a smile that does not reach their eyes, but so far, no shooting has erupted at least. 

"Welcome, Negan, and accept our thanks for bringing our beloved niece home to us."

The look Negan gives her is clearly questioning whether Ezekiel is completely full of shit with his royal we, but when she smiles, he shrugs. "The princess didn't tell you that she offered her services to my people in establishing our base of operations."

That gets her Ezekiel's concerned gaze, but more worryingly, a disgruntled noise from her brother that draws Negan's attention right to where she doesn't really want it.

"Holy shit, your highness. What the hell do you feed people around here?" There's a note of wariness in Negan's voice, as he looks between Honey and Jazz.

Bless him, Ezekiel laughs, that rich, amused sound that always makes her want to smile. "I'm afraid I can make no claim to being the reason my niece and nephew are so tall. Their late mother comes from an island people known for immense height, much like my bodyguard, Jerry."

Jazz plays along, thankfully, tugging off the costumed helm and finally breaking bodyguard character enough for Honey to hug him tightly. She turns just enough to peek out at Negan. "This is my baby brother, Jasper."

"Not sure that term applies to your brother much anymore, princess."

"Oh, he will be eighty and still the baby," she declares. The more she shows Jazz as subordinate to her, the safer he is from Negan's mercurial moods. "He is our veterinarian."

There. Jazz is a healer, not a warrior. He's play acting like Ezekiel. That's what Negan needs to believe. Nevermind that both men are capable warriors, not when she needs her people seen as non-threatening for her plan to work.

"Veterinarian, huh. You have enough damn critters for that to be necessary?" The gleam in Negan's eyes tells her that he's understood the prospect of fresh meat.

"We do. It has been a stellar year for our cattle and sheep in particular. The request for fresh food would include beef and lamb. I should get that delivery arranged." Ezekiel taps at Jerry's arm, and the big man hands over a radio. He lays out the order efficiently. "While we wait, perhaps we can provide refreshments?"

Honey restrains from laughing even as she reluctantly lets her brother go. "You are always prepared," she tells Ezekiel.

Homeblown bottles, sealed with corks, are brought forward, and one is given first to Negan to sample. "That is a damn fine homebrew," he exclaims, looking pleased. Waving a hand, he lets Jerry drift by with a basket of the chilled bottles for the rest.

A vehicle approaches, but this one isn't the payment. The mouthwatering scent of roast pork drifts to Honey from the metal trough used to serve up a whole pig. Ezekiel is offering up one of the pit cooked pigs served at the first of each month as part of a community celebration of the Kingdommers.

Tables and chairs are set up outside the gate, and she's grateful Negan's made no fuss about not being invited inside. He seems more than willing to accept the makeshift picnic offered to his soldiers, especially when Shiva's chain is secured to the inside base of one of the gate towers. But the food only distracts him for so long.

Cleaning his fingers on the offered napkin, the head of the Saviors eyes Ezekiel critically. "You never commented on the princess staying with my people."

Ezekiel spreads his hands in that theatrical way that conveys so much more than a simple shrug. "Our Hannah is of age and capable of her own decisions. If she has agreed to live within your community to assist its establishment, I will not be naysaying her decision."

The king's genial expression shifts, showing more of his canny intelligence than he's allowed to shine so far. "Some alliances are cemented by more than an exchange of goods and services, are they not? Sometimes they are of a more personal nature."

Negan's grin shows too much tooth to be entirely pleasant, but he nods. She's surprised that the man makes no overt claim, but she suspects he's too off center to go for crass behavior yet. Ezekiel has grasped the situation so clearly it is a relief.

If Jazz is here, it makes Honey wonder. Are any more of her family here? The idea that she won't be seen to reassure her parents makes her heart ache. And Paul and Eugene are nowhere to be seen, odd in itself.

"I will need the assistance of our engineer," she ventures, reaching for the lifeline she needs even more than Ezekiel and Jazz. "Is he on property today?"

Ezekiel shakes his head, looking disappointed. "I'm afraid he is out with the teams trying to locate you. We did signal the searchers to return home, but his team crossed into the capital in their efforts today."

The ache in her chest is raw and needy. She explains for Negan's sake. "Radio reception is questionable in DC. We have never been able to find out why."

"Do you really need this engineer?" There's a furrow in Negan's brow that tells her to tread carefully.

"He has a special expertise with electricity generation and the distillation of biofuel. He designs and I build. But he can manage to send me plans with our next delivery, I suppose." Shrugging, she toys with the remnants of food on her plate as beneath the table, Negan's hand closes briefly around her knee.

Further discussion is curtailed as the wagon loads of food arrive. Ezekiel's people rely on draft horses for much of their farm work, preferring to reserve vehicles for trips outside the walls. It emphasizes the agricultural kingdom image well. Transferring everything doesn't take long, and all too soon, Honey is hugging her brother and Ezekiel in farewell. 

To Ezekiel, she whispers quietly, "It is a Woodbury, and I am our Daniel." The statement won't mean much to the king, but once he repeats it, her family will understand. Daniel Navarro's near death by torture at the Governor's hands once his spying was discovered is something no Dixon will forget.

"Rather than a monthly delivery, we should deliver fresh foods weekly. It will be useless to send you vegetables that rot faster than you can eat them. Meat will be easier to send as well," Ezekiel proposes.

Honey could kiss the man for the ploy to allow her to check in more often. It's a sensible suggestion, too, as many items don't last long off the vine, and she doubts the gluttonous Saviors will ration out beef. She glances to Negan, who shrugs.

"Whatever keeps my people fed best and the payment worthwhile for the risk we take."

As they drive away, Negan's hand wanders possessively along her leg. "Seeing your baby brother going to be enough? Or will you get fucking homesick and trot back to your royal title and welcoming family?"

Honey sighs and gives him a smile she knows isn't as firm as she likes. She opts for lacing truth into the deception. "For a long time, he was mine to raise. Our father worked, we had no mother, so it was us against the world. But he has a life and a family now, and it is safe behind those walls. I don't have to hover over him like a mother who can't cut the apron strings."

He doesn't respond, just studies her with those too clever eyes. 

"Building your Sanctuary makes him safer, Negan. That's the important part where my brother is concerned."

Why that makes him smile like the cat that ate the canary, she doesn't know and doesn't have time to ask. Ahead of them, just where they turn north, are two Humvees trundling back toward the Kingdom.

"These are friendlies," she declares, spotting the encircled H of Hilltop on the hoods. "Recalled from the search."

When they stop, she has to calm her heart, because the first person to step out of the lead vehicle's passenger seat is Eugene.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's been a lot of chapters ago, but this dynamic of king and princess has been brewing since Ezekiel and Honey met. 😉
> 
> What does Negan think he's realized about Jazz's importance to Honey? Only time will tell.
> 
> Her not being told about Logan is deliberate.


	11. Tick Tock

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eugene joins the Saviors, falling into the unassuming role Honey needs him to play.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bit of a warning... This is entirely in Eugene's POV, but the role he plays will use stereotypes toward those who are not neurotypical. Some of the public behavior from this chapter forward between him and Honey is going to be uncomfortable as hell...

**June 1, 2017**

>\- Eugene -<

The joyous news of Honey's reappearance after seven days missing is immediately overshadowed by Ezekiel's people signalling something's wrong. Honey asked for the King, a role Ezekiel's played less and less over the years, and didn't come inside the gates. On the initial alert, no one was sure what it meant, other than getting the hell out of DC and ending their fruitless search.

The relief fades to a gnawing worry in his gut as another report trickles in thanks to a watch guard relaying what is happening from the confines of the tower. Honey isn't back to stay, instead negotiating supplies for the new group accompanying her. It seems she's staying with them.

"Does she appear to be under duress?" Scout's voice, cool and clinical, seeking answers in clear Chamorro. Eugene envies her that distant calm soldier personality she's worn for days now. It's a state he only achieves while medicated, and he can't do that during the day.

"No, but she greeted Ezekiel as her uncle?" The Kingdom's radio operator sounds puzzled and rightfully so. Honey and Exekiel are remarkably close, but they've never defined their friendship that way. "And she requested Shiva."

The tiger? They're laying something on thick, and Eugene mulls it over slowly.

"She's putting on a show." That's Paul, his own Chamorro as flawless as Scout's, but his voice less remote. He almost sounds excited. "When she saved me from the Wolves, she played gypsy, her and Danny."

Eugene remembers the story, how she 'purchased' Paul for a case of whiskey and another of various supplies. The men didn't live to enjoy their bounty, because Honey's act was a distraction: save the vulnerable, then send in the sniper. Jesus Christ.

He isn't the only one to make the connection to that long ago ploy. Scout curses in several languages, surprising him by having the radio live for it. She calms and adds, "We need more information to be able to help her. Paul, you and Eugene take just your two vehicles toward the Kingdom. Try to get there before they leave. Everyone else pull back for now."

The Marine's assurance that they will leave, and its implication that Honey will be gone with these newcomers, makes the gnawing in his gut turn to full fledged churning. He struggles to breathe for a minute, until his fingers find the leather cover on the watch she gave him the Christmas that he realized he was hopelessly in love with her. Pressing his palm against the watch face, he can feel the ticking of the mechanics.

Kal glances over from the driver's seat, obviously concerned, taking his attention away from the other Humvees being left behind. "It's Honey, right? She's probably got a half dozen plans ready."

Nodding, Eugene feels his turmoil settle. Honey always has a plan or three, thinking up things in the spur of the moment that most people wouldn't manage in days of planning. "We just have to trust her."

As the younger man smiles, Eugene reminds himself that there isn't a fighter at Hilltop his lover hasn't trained. There's a brotherhood there, a sense of loyalty that goes beyond community. Kal will support whatever this is.

The Kingdom radio reports are mundane for a while. Honey requested food in payment for protection Ezekiel's people do not need, and the King agreed, stalling with an impromptu picnic to buy Eugene and Paul more time. Everyone seems genial enough, although Jazz seems to be part of the Ezekiel family deception now. Paul's got to be crawling out of his skin right now.

They're still miles away when the guard's voice is replaced by Jazz's. "They're gone, and Honey went with them. We could only stall so long, although they'll be back for more food in a week. She told Ezekiel that she's found another Woodbury."

Eugene's heart sinks, although he understands now. If there are people at risk among these bandits, Honey would not abandon them easily. None of the Dixons would, because the concept of stranger doesn't exist if the stranger is vulnerable. He hasn't forgotten that Honey jumped on Abraham, a man big enough to dwarf even her tall frame, to save him once, and she knew him for all of fifteen minutes.

"Is that all the information she gave?" Scout asks, back to her clinical calm.

"Based on the amount of food requested, it's a big group. Maybe larger than Homestead." Dammit… that's over three hundred people, the largest Allied community. "She said she is our Daniel."

Eugene's heart sinks. Spying is dangerous in itself, but calling herself their Daniel? The youth nearly died, skin peeled off his chest by a psychotic bastard not fit to live. He's never truly recovered from the damage, not physically or psychologically.

"Is she harmed?" Scout's voice is pure, arctic ice now.

"Not that I could tell. I checked, as best I could without being obvious, when she hugged me." Jazz sounds lost and defeated. "The leader…" There's a pause for the younger man to clear his throat. "I think he's obsessed with her, and she's feeding it. Ezekiel said something about alliances being sealed by personal means, and that bastard's expression…"

Jesus fucking Christ. Eugene presses harder against the watch face, making the metal bite into his wrist. The minor pain anchors him, barely.

"It's a Black Widow," Scout replies. He can't decide if she sounds scared or impressed. Probably both. 

Trying to wrap his mind around it, some obvious phrase from the military training Honey's received, Eugene has to go further afield than military to make the connection. Black Widow… a term adopted by comic books because of being used in espionage. Kal's made the leap of logic, too, because he looks uneasy as he glances at Eugene.

Before Eugene can comment, the radio crackles to life again with Jazz's deep voice. "She was asking about Eugene. Wants him with her, I think. But she's calling him the engineer, not by name."

The connections link together so fast that Eugene can't breathe. How many times over the years has he made the joke about being Q to her James Bond? He reaches for the radio mike. "If we can intercept them, I'll join them."

The radio is silent for a bit, and just when he worries that Scout will order him not to, she speaks. "Can you handle that, if she's planning a Widow? That's a lot to ask of you." Her voice isn't cool anymore. She sounds concerned for him, but there's a note of warning, too.

He understands the warning. If he can't pull off his part, if he shows any inappropriate jealousy, it could endanger them both. But he doesn't think anyone understands just how fluid their relationship is. Out of everyone possible, they're the one couple he knows with practice at managing this regularly.

"I can handle it. She wouldn't ask for me if she didn't think I could." Of that, he is confident. Honey would never risk him. Some men might have a problem with their ladies being the protector, but for him, it's just their reality. And now, she needs him there, so he will go.

"Please be safe, Eugene." The warning is gone, leaving only concern. "Try to get some communication established that doesn't rely on traveling to the Kingdom, if you can."

He agrees, but there's no more time to plan. "Strangers sighted that match the Kingdom's description."

Discarding the mike, he starts stripping away his body armor and any obvious weaponry that gives away anything other than geeky engineer. Kal watches a bit wide eyed as he drops his third gun behind the seat to join his armor, then tosses the shoulder holster to join it. 

Honey has always been thorough in teaching him to go armed, and he hates leaving the Bond Arms derringer behind she drilled him on. But if he's searched, there's no mistaking he's carrying a deadly weapon, even if limited to less than seven yards. The only clear weapon he leaves is his belt knife. Even children carry those, these days.

Hesitating about rebuttoning his overshirt as Kal pulls over and stops, he asks, "Do I look non-threatening enough?"

The other man nods. "Be careful. Help her figure these bastards out."

Nodding, Eugene steps out of the Humvee, hunching his shoulders and slouching. It's almost too easy to pull up the old world version of himself, making him feel a little sick to be that man again, but for Honey? He can do it.

"Well, if it isn't my favorite engineer," Honey calls out, striding toward him after leaving the driver's seat. He catches a glimpse of a tall, well-built older man, but deliberately keeps his attention rivetes on Honey instead. His reward is her hand landing on his shoulder with a pat, before moving to pet his hair as if he was much younger. He revels in finally feeling her touch after days without, and the fact that she seems healthy and in control, like Jazz surmised.

The petting is a gesture she uses for Jazz, when her brother is struggling with his sensory issues. Jazz doesn't have as many problems as he once did, but Eugene thinks it's a signal. Not sure how to respond just yet, he smiles uncertainly, letting his gaze move to her companion. "The radio said you wanted me." 

Soft and meek, Eugene allows none of the bluster he used with Abraham and Rosita to leak into his voice or posture. Thinking of what most people assume about autism, he mentally sorts through the stereotypes as rapidly as possible. The bastard with her is already smirking, the smarmy idea of being a better man than this defective thing in front of him already evident in his posture.

"Why don't you introduce us, princess?" There's enough of a wary note in the man's voice to tell Eugene he's not a complete idiot.

Honey keeps petting his hair, before finally reaching out to straighen his rumpled overshirt. It settles into better lines, still haphazardly buttoned from him yanking the shoulder holster out from under it. "Look at you, pet. No one's been looking after you while I was gone, have they?"

When she finally answers the other man, she's sorting his buttons, carefully settling his green plaid shirt back into place over the Star Trek shirt he wears underneath. "This is Eugene, one of the smartest engineers I've ever met, but he needs a bit of a keeper, I'm afraid. Eugene, this is Negan. We're going to be living with his community now."

Her touch is soft as she cups his cheek and gently turns his head toward Negan. Eugene gets his first good look at the man, catching the moment the man accepts the deception. He's a pet, intelligent, but incapable of basic self care. It's brilliant, hiding the danger Eugene can pose among the prejudices so many have about those not neurotypical.

Drawing from more than autism stereotypes now, Eugene blinks a few times, looking at Negan and his disgusting smirk, before turning back to Honey. "Okay. You won't go away for days again?"

The relief in her expression is well hidden from someone who doesn't know her well, but Eugene catches it. Smiling, she pats his cheek. "No, I'll be right there to look after you. Who let you go into the capital instead of leaving you with my brother?"

With her voice dropping into a protective growl, he thinks she's about to sell the disguise further. None of the others can adapt fast enough except Paul, and technically, the other man is their group leader today. With Paul having hearing like a damned bat, Eugene also knows he's listening through a rolled down window. "Paul said it was okay."

Honey sighs, a deep expression of discontent, even as Negan chuckles. "Someone about to get an ass whipping?" he drawls.

"He's only safe because he's my brother-in-law." Donning that forbidding expression she often uses when training people, she pats Eugene's shoulder. "You go sit in the back seat, pet. We'll get things sorted out for you when we get home."

Nodding, Eugene trots off to the truck Honey was driving, climbing into the seat behind the driver's seat without a backwards glance. It takes every ounce of self control to do it, but breaking character right now will ruin all her hard work. He has no idea how much groundwork she's laid that he risks tripping up.

Through the windshield, he can see as she summons Paul, but he can't hear what is said. As he expected, Paul plays his part beautifully, going from anxious to eager to please to ashamed of himself. There's a reason the family jokes that the man is Honey's long lost twin at times. From the shelter of the vehicle, Eugene watches the bandit leader as the man watches Honey.

Jazz is correct. This man is obsessed with Eugene's lover. He's seen milder versions of it before, especially in the earlier years of his relationship where people didn't comprehend why a woman who looks like Honey would deign to be with a man who looks like Eugene. It's something she stamped out by lurid descriptions of their sex life to any idiot dumb enough to question her.

That's not going to work with this man, and he suspects the usual bedroom ban Honey maintains on anyone who questions his importance to her probably isn't going to come into play. He's fine with that. It's time he protects her in that arena.

When Paul finally walks away, shoulders slumped in pretend shame, Honey and Negan return to the truck. She looks up at him in the rearview mirror. "Put your seatbelt on, pet."

Eugene buckles in, head bowed as he listens to their conversation. His hair is loose enough from the tie to let him use it as a shield to watch Negan covertly.

"Holy shit, gorgeous. I almost felt bad for the man. Might have been kinder to smack him around."

Honey shrugs, taking a deep breath. "You have your rules. I have mine. Eugene doesn't go into the city where it's dangerous. We can't replace his brain, not like all the damned muscle can be."

"And yet you fucked him? Probably more than once, if you got a baby out of him." Negan sounds puzzled, but also intrigued.

Catching the smirk on Honey's face in the rear view mirror when he peeks upward, Eugene refrains from laughing at her nonchalant reply: "He's pretty."

The actual conception didn't even have Paul in the same room, but Negan doesn't need to know that. Eugene isn't entirely sure it wouldn't titillate the man just as much as the idea of Honey having sex with Paul does.

"I hope he was more goddamned interesting than a blow up doll," Negan says at last. The comment seems a bit odd, but Eugene will figure it out later. Negan's hand snakes over, sliding along Honey's thigh. It confirms Eugene's idea that the man is either sleeping with her or doing his best to get there. He can deal with that.

Alpha males think with their dicks too much for their own good. All this supposed bandit leader is doing is handing Eugene and Honey the detailed directions to his downfall every time she lets him touch her. He can almost feel the countdown in his head. Secure in the thought, Eugene's fingers find his watch again, feeling the mechanism tick softly beneath them.

Tick, tock, asshole.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay... Now I gotta go write the happy last chapter of my Eugene/Beth story to bleach my brain...
> 
> I really do mean the warning. Her calling him a pet? Negan will see Eugene as a bit of Honey's possession like the wives are his. He will sleep in Honey's room even with Negan present... Just keep that in mind. 😳


	12. All That Counts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eugene explores the Sanctuary, Negan begins to deal with things he hasn't confronted in years, and the Dixons circle the wagons to support Honey.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Negan's section isn't horrible, but could be a little ick if you keep in mind the nature of Honey and Eugene's open relationship.

**June 1, 2017**

>-< Eugene >-<

When the trucks pull into the old resort, now turned into a makeshift compound, Eugene observes all he can. He's careful to keep his expression blandly curious, as he's not entirely sure what Honey wants him to do yet. Years of being at her side grants him an eye for strategy on a larger scale than just protecting himself or her.

The people are a mixture of healthy and not, and something twists inside him. Even Woodbury didn't starve anyone. He can understand why Honey needs to infiltrate here, especially when it's the weakest who move forward to unload the food and supplies.

Honey's hand closes around his elbow. "Stay with me. We've got some projects to tour that I need you to put on your thinking cap for."

Nodding, he keeps up the curious innocence, avoiding the soldiers for the workers. If nothing else, making this sort of thing more efficient is always a good start. Projects mean that maybe she's improving things, but why? He can't imagine these people wanting to stay in a place that treats them this way. The Woodbury folks certainly refused to rebuild.

At least he finally knows the man's name. Watching the downtrodden kneel with chants of his name? At least the lazing soldiers had to do that, too. So far, no one's ordered him to kneel. Until Honey requires it, he won't.

Finally, Negan gets bored with the activity and Honey's supervisor duties. He drops a big hand on her shoulder. "I did promise you the drudges if you came through, princess."

Honey smiles, looking pleased. "You did."

Negan bangs on the hood of a truck, causing everyone to halt and some to shudder. "New chain of command. If you ain't a soldier? Your worthless ass belongs to our lieutenant here. Whatever she says, goes. When you eat, when you sleep, when you take a damn shit, that's hers to decide. She says lick her goddamned boots, only question you're allowed is can you have salt with that. You fucking understand?"

A chorus of agreement rings out from the workers, all falling to their knees. The soldiers look confused and worried, darting glances between Negan's shit eating grin, Honey's serene expression, and a balding man nearby. 

The third man studies the scene before laughing. "Good luck with those stupid bastards. They're a full time job to get an ounce of work out of."

Honey just quirks the smallest of smiles at the man. "Perhaps you didn't understand how to apply the right incentive, Simon." She steps forward and tips the chin upward of a woman in her forties who looks fearful. "Come meet with me in an hour, Brooke. I have some changes I'll be making."

"Yes, ma'am. Soon as all the food is put away, I'll be there." Surprisingly, she darts a glance at Eugene before getting to her feet and herding the others back to work.

Hours later, Eugene is exhausted in a way he hasn't been in years. A community this far in disrepair? Normally, it would be abandoned, the people absorbed into the others as they chose. Instead, he's been led all over, inspecting systems and the wall as a sweating and somewhat inept man they call an engineer attempts to explain what he's cobbled together here.

Honey started the tour, before being called away to deal with a mechanical issue on a truck needed for a raid tomorrow. The man's excessive sweating probably leads back to her creative threats of what would befall the man if Eugene was the least bit distressed upon his return to her. He's in too good a shape to be one of the workers Honey took over, but soldier or not, the man she called Fat Joey is petrified of Honey.

After making sure he had a meal in the kitchens, Joey leads him to an upper level of the largest resort building, up four flights of stairs. "Elevator takes too much juice," he mumbles, looking like he's a few steps off a heart attack by the third floor landing.

"That's fixable," Eugene replies quietly. "Everything is fixable with the right comprehension and tools."

That gets him a wheezing laugh. "Man, I can tell you're new here. Nothing is fucking fixable here."

Eugene stares at him until he squirms, even as he holds open the fourth floor landing. Once he's got his escort that uneasy, he smiles at the man. "You haven't learned the new rules yet, then."

Joey keeps gaping at him all the way to a set of doors he backs away from after leaving Eugene standing there. "What're those?" he asks hoarsely.

"Mechanics always fix things." Staring at the man, he runs a finger along the notebook he was given for his inspection.

"And you're a mechanic?"

Eugene shakes his head. "I'm an engineer. I design. She's the one who builds and fixes."

Joey looks toward the suite doors. "She can't fix this place."

Tapping his watch, Eugene smiles a little vapidly. "She always fixes things. It's who she is." He turns the handle and steps into the sunlit room beyond. There's no one here, and his smile widens as he completes the thought. Sometimes you just have to tear something completely apart to fix it.

Placing his notebook on the table, he inspects the suite. There's the main area, with a couch, chairs, and a small dining table. No kitchenette like some places, so it was meant more for luxury than utility during a stay. He's seen the kitchens here. Once? This place was as swanky as they came.

There are two bedrooms, and he can tell which of the two is Honey's without any clues other than the painfully tidy corner room contrasting with the second room having laundry not yet put away and sewing projects scattered around. Honey's got her own quirks, and everything being neat and tidy? That's her.

Using the bathroom, he sits at the desk near the couch in the alcove of the main bedroom, finding her own sketchbook and notes easily and sets down to work. Honey was too careful about her instructions to Joey, so he has no wish to wander. Not yet.

>-< Negan >-<

Leaving his princess to her duties was a test of his own willpower for Negan. He doesn't have anything particularly pressing to do, but the everyday clutter of work bores the fucking hell out of him. His suite overlooks the courtyards, not the river, because he gets a thrill out of watching them scurry from above.

On the balcony, he reclines in a chair with a bottle of the homebrew sent as part of the tribute. Below, he sees Honey leading her defective little engineer by the elbow, his own idiot trailing them as they inspect what she deems necessary. It doesn't take long before someone needs her attention. He wonders if Fat Joey pissed himself at being left in charge of Honey's pet.

Her willingness to leave the engineer to another settles something within him. Admitting an unease about the awkward man isn't something he would ever fucking do, but after a day of watching her tiptoe around her old life, his skin crawls with the need to have her close. It's a weakness, though, so he resists.

Even a leisurely fuck with each of his remaining wives doesn't remove that addictive sense of wondering where exactly Honey is. Summoning food for her room, he makes his way down the hall to her suite. Amber's in the main area, but scurries away into her room quickly. It's fucking funny how much the woman thinks he'll change his mind.

Not a goddamn chance. This afternoon is proof to him that he's let his head get all fucked up since Honey came here. As boring as his wives were before now, all he can imagine now is fucking blow up dolls. He used to harass the hell out of that kind of man, back when the world had sex shops.

Honey's bedroom door isn't shut, so he can hear her voice. There's a rhythm to it, as if she's reading instead of speaking normally. Nudging it the rest of the way open, he sees her curled against the arm of the couch in the alcove. 

Beside her, sitting on the floor with a mass of sketches and notebooks around him, is the little engineer she hasn't called anything but Pet around him. She's even carding her fingers through the goddamn man's hair as she reads from a novel he hates to admit he knows is a fucking Robert Heinlein novel. 

When she looks up at him, she grins and shuts the book with a thump that doesn't startle the other man in the least. "C'mere, Negan. I told you Eugene is a damned genius."

Leaning Lucille against the dresser on his way by, Negan crosses the room and takes the spot she vacates by swinging her bare legs down to either side of her pet. Leaning down, she plucks a set of sketches from the seeming chaos and passes it to him. Although her legs stay tucked around Eugene, she turns all her attention on Negan as he studies the sketches, watching him with the same intensity she has in bed.

Once upon a time, Negan had to sit through fucking mind numbing meetings to review additions to the high school, so he actually comprehends about half of the plans he's looking at. For a man making do with artist sketch pads instead of a drafting table, this actually looks good. Even as he looks up, Eugene's muttering to himself, dragging a book from a pile to check a reference.

"Is this a fucking electrical substation?" Negan asks, frowning. He may have been a gym coach, but he's not an uneducated moron. "What's the fuel?"

"The river." Honey's blue eyes are sparkling. "Eugene's wanted to design one for a while, but there wasn't a suitable water source close by. Here? It's right behind the building."

"And he can build this?" Actual damn electricity not dependent on biofuel? It's something he's never found anyone capable of doing. It changes just about everything.

"Alone? No. I'll help, and maybe that sweaty idiot who wets himself a little everytime I ask questions about the functions we need running here." Honey shifts position so that she's kneeling on the couch and facing him, looking animated and too goddamned excited about greasy mechanical projects.

"I need those back." The distracted voice interrupts Negan's study between Honey and the generator plans. She plucks them away and passes them to the hand waving up above the other man's shoulder.

"No more fuel conservation because we need it for the vehicles over the generators. He's got stacks of other plans, but we start there. It's perfect."

Negan really fucking likes her excitement. "Yeah, gorgeous, it is perfect. Deserves a perfect fucking award, too." Hauling her astride his lap is easy enough, and she laughs as she straddles him, leaning in for a kiss that crosses into filthy faster than he expected with their guest.

"I get more than a kiss as a reward, right? Today I solved a lot of problems." Honey's voice is low and husky, making his body react even faster.

Negan looks toward where Eugene is still scribbling in a notebook. "Thought an audience pissed you off, princess."

She slides off his lap, dragging him to his feet. "I don't like being the audience."

Frowning, Negan allows himself to be led away toward the bed. "Seems… damned weird even for me. He's missing his marbles. Be like having a kid in the room."

She actually looks pissed, letting go of his hand and stalking away. "Eugene isn't a child. His brain works differently than mine or yours, but he's a grown man with all the normal things that entails."

Negan looks between her and Eugene, who exchanges the notebook for a sketchbook and ruler even as he watches. Honey's posture is giving away something he doesn't like. "You've fucked him."

Honey shrugs. "When the mood strikes, if he's interested. All that attention and focus can be appealing."

"Why the hell are you trying to fuck me then?" Negan's angry now, raising his voice. "You got your engineer back." And he fucking let her, thinking the man no rival at all. She isn't one of his wives. There's no expectation of her only fucking him, especially when he gave her a damned wife of her own.

Honey closing the gap to snatch at the fabric of his shirt isn't what he expects. "Men are always such dumbasses. I was trying to fuck you because I damn well want to. You don't own me. He doesn't own me. No one fucking owns me."

Negan honestly expects to be punched, not kissed and shoved backward onto the bed. Angry sex isn't something he's had since his wife got sick, but he forgets about their potential audience fast enough it's stupid of him. If Honey doesn't care, why the hell should he?

>-< Jazz >-<

The joys of the Kingdom is that like Hilltop and Homestead, the place has tunnels. The usual worry that someone might be spotted and trailed is mostly eliminated by this fact. Now that Honey's been found, the search can be ended and people return home, but for now, until they get more information, they've got to stay off the radar. Ezekiel comes with them, saying he needs to speak to Carol and Merle himself.

No one complains about the five mile hike out beyond the tunnels to where Homesteaders wait. Half escort the Hilltop militia home, and half take Jazz and Paul to Alexandria. Jazz isn't surprised when Shane gets out of the truck's passenger seat to climb in the back, letting him sit up front with Scout.

He's seen Scout interrogate people before, and the trip to Alexandria is close enough to that experience he would be offended if it were anyone except Honey she was questioning him about. In the rearview mirror, Shane looks torn between sympathy and launching his own interrogation. When they pull through the gates at Alexandria, they don't even get out of the vehicle before Jazz's parents are there.

His mother can't stop hugging him, and his father? Merle's been understandably on edge since he arrived in Virginia. Now, he's pacing, damn near non-verbal in his anger and agitation, and even Carol's soothing voice doesn't work. All of the Alexandrians are staying as far away as they can, leaving the matter to the Homesteaders for now.

Paul's experiencing Scout's interrogation now, giving her all the details of his own brief encounter with Honey and the man who's responsible for Danny's death and Logan's life altering injuries. As soon as they're done, Ezekiel doesn't even wait for Scout to ask a question.

"Woodbury? Jesus fucking Christ. We don't need another of those," Merle grumbles, finally stopping his pacing to gently pry Carol away from Jazz so he can collect his husband close instead.

"Specifically mentioning Daniel, that's concerning," Scout muses, her own pacing less frenetic than their father's. "It's a clue that this leader is unstable. We know what he was capable of."

Jazz remembers not only Daniel the spy, but also that woman found in the hidden basement. Martina never recovered from her trauma, taking her own life within a year. He shivers, and Paul leans heavily against him. Jazz wants this over, for his sister to not be so gung ho about saving people that she walks into that kind of danger. 

Scout stops short, looking at everyone but not seeing them. Jazz feels like she's a million miles away. "There's no reason to think he's the same type of psychopath as the Governor. She's not hiding that she's an outsider. It's an advantage, hiding the lies within the truth. And she isn't alone."

"You claimed it was a Black Widow attempt. How can they pull that off with him there?" Carol sounds horrified, and Jazz can't begin to imagine what her background with her ex-husband makes his mother think. "They're as good as married."

Paul clears his throat, drawing everyone's attention. "They aren't exactly monogamous. If it's possible for anyone to go undercover as a couple, it's them." Jazz nods in agreement. He doesn't entirely understand his sister and Eugene's relationship, but it's theirs and makes them happy.

Scout sighs, rubbing at her scarred shoulder. "He's right. She's capable of separating sex and emotional attachment. Always has been. Is Eugene? Probably."

Abraham makes a sound that should be laughter but sounds half strangled. "Eugene? We all know that damn man would be her second command in hell itself if that's what she decided made her happy."

"So what do we do?" It's Sophia who asks, standing wide eyed with her hands over her distended belly. Carl's got an arm around her, but Jazz isn't sure who is supporting who.

Jazz takes a deep breath. "We maintain their cover, give them what they need to save these people, and then when they come home to us? They're ours like they always were."

No one argues his pronouncement, not that he expected them to. It's just what their family does. Weather the storm and figure out the rest as they need to. In the end, all that counts is family.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, more thrown out chapters and nearly a two week time jump to just ignore these scenes... But it finally happened.
> 
> It may be a jump to the next one, depending on when I want to start the unrest at Hilltop.
> 
> Future warning: Negan may seem to tip sympathetic in character at times. This still will not be a story where he lives happily after for years.


	13. Nothing is Simple

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Negan backpedals a little with Honey, even as Eugene brings a worrisome reality to her attention. Jazz deals with unexpected politics at Hilltop and the Kingdom.

**June 20, 2017**

>-< Negan >-<

Negan's been back in the compound for half an hour, and he isn't the only one watching the project unfolding in front of him. The hydroelectric system Honey's engineer designed and she and Fat Joey built has been running for nearly two weeks now. They haven't had a single gap in power, even with running non-essentials like the elevators in the buildings. It's fucking impressive, as is the water filtration system running alongside it for river water.

Of all the projects to start next, he hadn't expected plumbing to be the priority. Electricity is a damned flashy, dynamic resource everyone understands. Water that doesn't have to be laboriously hand filtered and boiled? Definite win. But sewage? That fucking baffled him at first, especially when their system was working quite well, he thought.

Apparently, the town's sewer system had been elderly and near failure even before the outbreak. Years of no maintenance, followed by sudden use? Even Negan's lack of experience with the concepts grasped the impending mess they'd faced.

Honey's soldiers have been standing guard over a construction crew. Some of the workers are drudges that Honey discovered had some useful background. Others are drudges that she's thrown into training with the declaration that experience is the best teacher. What was once an open parking lot across the road from the compound is now the biggest goddamn septic system he's ever seen.

"The drudges are almost too fucking cheerful," Negan observes, leaning against a parked backhoe. 

Gavin glances at him, looking a little wary. "They do seem a little enthusiastic for a project that involves sewage."

Negan watches as Eugene and Honey climb out of a pit, both looking about as grubby as human beings can manage. When she directs workers, their response is quick and efficient. It makes him picture the career she would have had if the world hadn't gone to fucking hell.

"It's not that different from your soldiers," Laura comments, drawing both men's attention. She shrugs. "They know you aren't afraid to get your hands dirty. Same thing here. Just a different sort of dirty."

As Honey radios in an order to a crew in the actual compound, the entire construction crew clusters around the pit in question. Negan wanders closer, looking down to the conglomeration of pipes and tanks. The tanks aren't covered, so the influx of water is easily visible.

"Just how many toilets are they fucking flushing over there?"

Honey laughs, flashing him a tired smile. "That's the next system over. This is the washing machines and showers. We redirected most of the gray water to this system, since it doesn't need an excess of treatment." She continues with a short explanation of the necessity of separating the systems, flow volume, and enough fucking technicality that she sounds like her damned pet engineer and his verbose, encyclopedic speech for a minute. He tunes it out, knowing Gavin will probably make better sense of it than he will anyway.

Instead, he turns his attention on the oddball. Eugene's hopped back into the pit, intent on the junctures of pipe and tanks. It took Negan a while to dial in the man's affliction to some variation of autism, and he fucking wishes he'd actually paid attention to the damned inservice bullshit at his high school more than the basics not to get his ass in a sling over violating some federal mandate.

Negan's yet to figure the bastard out. He's not stupid or so self involved that he doesn't clue in that the man is devoted to Honey in a way that ought to piss him off more than it does. But the engineer seems to have a unique ability to disregard that Honey's fucking Negan. Hearing about voyeurism and actually experiencing it is an entirely different goddamn thing.

"Everything is holding as designed," Eugene calls up to Honey. He glances toward Negan, expression as absentminded as always. Negan still hasn't decided whether or not to be fucking offended by the fact that he as a person doesn't even register on Eugene's radar.

"Alright. Leave it uncovered for the next week for observation. We'll start the sewage side up tomorrow." Honey glances around the workers and waves a hand in dismissal. "Put away the tools and go help test out the gray water capacity. I'd best see every single one of you shiny clean by lights out. Families, too."

The little bastards are actually smiling at the orders to go bathe their stench away. It's fucking weird. Water use has been limited until recently, reserved for the soldiers and removing potential contamination from walkers.

Although once Honey steps closer, he can almost understand the necessity. There are things that smell worse in a world swarmed with the fucking dead, but the woman definitely has spent a day with motors, musty scented soil, and pure human sweat. Since he knows how often she bathes, the drudges must be a damned assault on the senses.

"You gonna follow your own damned orders?" Negan drawls. 

She smirks at him and steps even closer. "Afraid of eau de construction?"

Gavin and Laura make themselves scarce the second she moves in that close. These lieutenants don't care for his private life lived so publicly, unlike the other two. Neither of them dabble with the workers or soldiers, and unlike Regina, Laura's never fucked Negan himself. They're content to pretend they live celibate lives, as if Negan can't spot fuck buddies from a mile away. Whatever makes them sleep at night.

Negan grins, accepting the kiss Honey offers. "You are about a half step ahead of the fence guardians."

Arching a brow, Honey steps backward. "Guess I'll manage to get clean on my own then."

Negan shrugs, because the idea of bathing with her is tempting, but also too fucking intimate. She's under his skin in a dangerous way. When sleeping beside her at night seemed a necessity rather than a bonus leading to a leisurely morning fuck, he put a stop to that practice.

Then the damned socially defective engineer simply took the spot he left open. Negan's trapped himself between his own pride and something he never admits anymore: fear. The last person he allowed to be important died on him, of a problem impossible for him to fix. It's not something he intends to face again.

Distance is the best way to keep this fuck buddy routine going. It's the best of both fucking worlds. Athletic and goddamn creative sex without any demands for baubles, time, or discussions of feelings. Let the little awkward bastard deal with that side of things.

Eugene's watching them even now as Negan backs away, blinking in that irritating, owlish way of his. As always, he doesn't speak to Negan, never fucking does unless Negan speaks to him first. Half the time, he isn't even sure the man registers that he's in the vicinity unless he's actually interacting with Honey. Negan does step back close and claims another kiss. Eugene's expression flickers from bland to intent, and Negan still can't decide if it's just goddamn creepy or not.

"I'll take you up on the offer behind that kiss after you've had some time to detach from the day's work." Whistling to himself, he goes back to fetch Lucille from the engine cover of the backhoe. Keeping it simple is exactly what he needs to do. It worked with that little coed that let him fuck her silly every time his wife's cancer treatments got overwhelming. It'll work now, too.

>-< Honey >-<

The hot water in Honey's oversized tub no longer inspires guilt like it initially did. Between the electricity and water filtration, the hygiene levels of every resident are where they should be. It irks her that she still has to make it a specific order at times, but undoing the brainwashing the workers endured is a marathon process, not a sprint.

Today, she's too exhausted to actually bathe. It's been a long slog of getting just the basic infrastructure supported here, but she can already see the progress made. Hope is starting to spark among not just the workers. Even soldiers not on her squad are taking notice of better conditions. She hasn't had to physically remind anyone of Eugene's uniquely protected status as a non-soldier since the hydroelectric came online.

Hell, he's probably safer than she is now. She's a decent engineer, when she has to be. But her real talent has always been in the building, not the designing. She doesn't have Eugene's sheer genius for it, nor his memory for almost anything he's ever read.

The shower cuts off, and Eugene steps out of the separate unit. She could have showered with him, since Negan ignores Eugene as much as Eugene carefully ignores him. Since the arrogant leader isn't here, whatever occurs is between herself and Eugene.

But the complete lack of energy at the end of the day is kicking her ass. She's barely even awake now that the hot water is soaking away the day's sore muscles as well as the grime. Her drowsy state has Eugene kneeling next to the tub.

"Let me wash your hair." Eugene is clad in a towel as he kneels next to the tub, reaching for the shampoo even as she sinks beneath the water briefly to assist by wetting her long hair.

Tub baths are something Eugene's never enjoyed and avoids when all possible. They don't even have a bathtub in their little cottage at Hilltop, something Honey thinks should be added to the design now. There's an entirely different sensation in Eugene's careful attention to helping her wash her hair compared to the same task in a shower stall. She's no longer his equal in height, this way.

"I need to know something," Eugene says, voice soft even as he rinses her hair one final time. "We need to know before we go to the Kingdom tomorrow." There's a note in his voice that sends a shiver down her spine despite the warmth of the water.

Honey plants her feet to slide to a sitting position, turning in the water to kneel and face him. Her first thought is that this is finally too much for him. "What's wrong, Eugene?"

Cupping her face between his hands, he leans in for a kiss that is nothing like the ones she exchanged with Negan outside. This isn't seeking to arouse, just a slow exploration more akin to a rare lazy morning in bed. He smiles as he moves back, placing one last gentle kiss on her forehead.

"I need you to take this." The piece of plastic he lays on the side of the tub is unmistakable. Goodness knows she took enough of them in the three months it took to conceive MJ. 

She shakes her head, not even wanting to consider that possibility. "That can't happen."

"Hannah." His blue eyes are so earnest as he reaches out and cups her cheek. "I know what pregnancy is like for you. Nothing is foolproof, and you know the failure rates as well as I do."

She does, because he's discussed them with her, especially as the pre-outbreak medical supplies age well beyond any tested shelf life. No one trusts birth control pills or patches, but the hormonal IUDs have generally held reliable. This had been their compromise after MJ's birth, when Eugene considered a vasectomy. As long as they aren't fully monogamous, Honey saw no reason for him to undergo surgery.

Her mood shifts from denial to horror even as the signs add up in her head. She's never had a period with an IUD, and no nausea with pregnancy. But the exhaustion? Oh God. From two weeks into the pregnancy with MJ until the end of the first trimester, Honey had been beyond exhausted. Some of the family jokingly called it pregnancy induced narcolepsy.

The distressed sound she makes as she scrambles out of the water and into Eugene's arms makes him hold her tightly. He rocks her against him. "We need to know. You can't leave the IUD in if you're pregnant, and the risk of an ectopic pregnancy…"

Eugene is right. He's so fucking right. It takes every ounce of courage she has to take that test off the side of the tub and go take care of what needs to be done. Of all the risks she thought she was taking, that was not one of them.

Any ounce of planning escapes Honey as she watches the timer tick away on his watch. Eugene wraps a robe around her and leans against the counter and holds her close. "How did you get that?" she asks, deciding talking is better than silence. This is nothing like the happy anticipation of the last time they did this together.

"Requisitioned it as part of a bunch of random supplies. No one questions my experiments here anymore, you know that." The success of Eugene's engineering here is how they managed for Eugene to cobble together a radio to contact the Kingdom. It isn't reliable yet, but he's ready to send morse code once tomorrow's visit gets a counterpart radio on the receiving end.

"Mad scientist works on more than just Negan, right?" Her attempt at teasing is weak, but he chuckles anyway. He runs a hand gently down her back, and she buries her face in the clean scent of his skin at his shoulder.

The watch beeps, the tiny sound feeling almost as bad as the sight of those guns being drawn on her caravan weeks ago. Honey can't bring herself to look, but it's funny how Eugene admires her courage when he's braver than she is when it really counts. He shifts, obviously reaching for the damned plastic stick.

She doesn't need to ask the results, because Eugene drops the plastic nightmare into the sink with a clatter, returning that arm to hold her even tighter. He presses a kiss to her forehead.

"What do we do now?" she asks, barely finding her voice.

"We see Harlan. You get the ultrasound and the IUD taken care of. If it's not ectopic, then you decide what you want to do."

An ultrasound will confirm the math. As much as Eugene has adamantly not wanted biological children in the six and a half years they've been together, that would be infinitely preferable to what the reality probably is. She wouldn't be that lucky. Is it really as simple as what she wants here?

Somehow she doesn't think so.

>-< Jazz >-<

Jazz doesn't get livid very often, but the news out of Hilltop definitely ignites his usually dormant Dixon temper. The funny part is that his mood seems to ripple across the communal dining hall of Ezekiel's Kingdom like a wave preceding him. The king himself is definitely alert to the fact that Jazz is about to vibrate right out of his skin. But Ezekiel isn't Jazz's target.

"Did you fucking know?" He doesn't control his volume in the least, and even normally stoic Dianne flinches at the shout.

Harlan Carson pales and doesn't answer, and that's as good as an answer for Jazz. Paul catches his arm, grip firm. "Jasper? What's going on?"

"A number of Hilltop residents petitioned the Council to expel my sister from residence there for failure to fulfill her duties to the community." The sheer fucking gall of putting forth a Council vote an hour after Jazz and Paul left for the Kingdom to maintain Honey's cover story sours every positive feeling Jazz has ever had for his adopted home. "They pulled Olivia in as soon as we were gone."

With Jazz there, there's no way the two turncoat bastards on the Council would have swayed Bertie to vote on their side. The gentle natured school teacher would've listened to Jazz to wait until emotions had time to ebb, but with just Olivia to make the argument that no decisions should be made while everyone is grieving their losses, the vote didn't even end in a tie.

"Jesus Christ," his husband mutters, looking horrified. "Olivia radioed you? Has anyone told your mother yet?"

"It was an email," Jazz says slowly, turning to face Harlan again. "And it went to all of the family in every community."

Jazz can only imagine the juggernaut Carol Dixon is about to set underway. Hilltop's partnership with Homestead is the oldest one in the Alliance, if you count the current Terminus community as established after Honey and Jesus first met on a remote Virginia road the first winter after the outbreak. It's about to die an ugly, painful death.

The realization dawns on Harlan, but he wants to deny it. "She wouldn't put the Alliance on the line over Hilltop expelling one person."

Jazz smiles grimly even as he meets Ezekiel's gaze steadily. "Not the entire Alliance."

The king nods in understanding, sighing deeply. "I assume you will not be staying at Hilltop either? You and yours are always welcome here, so long as I am leader of the Kingdom."

"Olivia is arranging for the removal of all our personal items from all three of our homes. My family will assist her with the relocation once they arrive."

"Olivia is leaving, too?" Harlan sounds puzzled. "I understand your own wish, as Honey is your sister, but why would Olivia leave? She's been on the Council since it existed."

Jazz scoffs and shifts toward Harlan even with Paul's grip. "Did you forget who she's married to?"

Obviously, Harlan has forgotten that Bryce Roberts grew up in the same Georgia county as Jazz because he frowns. "Bryce's first wife was my fifth grade teacher, Harlan. And his brother dated my sister for three years. They're Dixons. They just don't carry the name." Like Danny didn't. 

"People are angry, Jazz. They lost family members, and she's still not explained what happened."

"It's been explained why she hasn't returned. We lost family, too."

"Not blood family."

It's only a lifetime of self-control that keeps Jazz from punching the asshole. To try to imply that losing Danny isn't a goddamned nightmare just because he isn't family by blood? "You live in a fucking dream world if you think blood is all that makes family. I hope your wife understands she's not actually your family."

Jazz doesn't go for the really low blow, but only because it involves a child. Despite Ezekiel being Gideon's biological father, the king has always considered Harlan the boy's second parent after months of not knowing which man was the boy's father.

It's Dianne who lays a hand on Harlan finally. It's strangely gentle, but Jazz thinks the man looks more shaken by that than Jazz's own shouting. Her tone is carefully neutral as she speaks. "We need to discuss just how much information your brother has about our agreement with our newest neighbors. If you've endangered anyone, Harlan, you'll be joining your brother at Hilltop."

Ezekiel stands, looking about twenty years older as he studies his long time friend. "I will attempt to moderate the damage," he says. "But your brother and his ally on the Council haven't considered what will happen when the news spreads through the Alliance."

"Hilltop can survive without Homestead." Harlan's on his feet now, but reality is starting to set in.

"Perhaps. But if you think any of the Georgia communities will stay allies, you are in for a surprise." Ezekiel reaches out to take Jazz's elbow. "Let's go deal with the politics, Jasper. Dianne will handle the security."

The young veterinarian stares down the obstetrician for a moment longer. Years of medical training under both Carson brothers has him feeling numb at the idea that either of them would think this was something acceptable to do to his sister. "I hope you can face being a coward, Harlan, because that's all you are."

Jazz allows Ezekiel to lead him away. If this fucking political maneuvering pokes so much as a whisker outside the walls of Hilltop and endangers Honey Dixon, he thinks Hilltop has no idea what will rain down on that errant community.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Although I killed off Gregory, alas, some of the remaining Hilltop Council is a bit cowardly as well. At least Emmett Carson's got a better fate than ending up with Negan here... The unnamed Council member, for those who don't remember, is Noah's father, who Hershel and Cricket saved from a tetanus infection in RBM.
> 
> There's more to come, but it wasn't going to fit in one chapter. 🤭


	14. As Safe As She Can Make Her

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Olivia calls Hilltop to a community vote that has larger consequences than expected when Carol manuevers to protect Honey.

**June 20, 2017**

>-< Olivia >-<

Olivia chose Hilltop as her home at a time when she didn’t think Alexandria could ever change enough under Deanna’s leadership for her to be comfortable there. She didn’t expect it to be anything more than a community where an abusive, alcoholic male doctor was allowed free reign to harm his family because people trusted the heterosexual male general practice doctor more than the lesbian female psychiatrist. Somewhere along the way, Alexandria had advanced, although she had been correct it wouldn’t do so under Deanna’s leadership.

Instead, as the visitors pour off the Homestead emblazoned vehicles, there’s a single Alexandria Humvee that holds Aaron and Spencer, along with two men she recognizes as probably being along to help Carol’s people with any heavy lifting. Carol’s interaction with her is brief, asking her to call a community meeting. As Olivia watches the normally warm and motherly woman assess the slowly gathering crowd, she slips back to stand alongside Spencer.

“How is your mother doing?” she asks. It’s a ritual between them by now, and the younger man shrugs. 

“Still too stubborn to officially resign, but Alexandria seems content enough with the unofficial council we’ve been running. No sense in denting what pride she has left.” Spencer’s careful tiptoeing around his mother’s stroke and the odds that she’ll ever recover enough to lead Alexandria again is a maturity she didn’t expect of the spoiled rich boy she met when the military first herded them into Alexandria.

“Are you their official representative for whatever happens tonight?” she asks. Her own decisions have been made, although she understands why Carol’s here, making certain that a community doesn’t pay the price of their leadership’s poorly advised decisions. 

Spencer nods. “Aaron and I both are. Mother designed us officially, and the rest of the council will follow suit.”

Olivia doesn’t think Carol is going to get positive results. Something about the long peace and ease of life here has caused Hilltop in general to grow conceited in their prominence as the largest and most advanced of the Virginia Allies. There’s a feeling that they’re too essential for any consequences, and she doubts they understand the significance of turning on one of their own. 

Most have never read the actual alliance agreements. Homestead has always been so carefully velvet gloved and generous that Olivia actually saw Emmett and Michael relax when it was Carol who arrived and not Merle or Shane, the other two Homestead council members currently in Virginia. It’s a mistake, because years of being part of the extended Dixon clan means Olivia knows without a doubt, the two most dangerous are two of the sweetest tempered, and one of them is reading the Hilltoppers like the open books they are. The other will probably never return after the betrayal of the council.

By Olivia’s estimate, everyone is here, so she bids Spencer and Aaron goodbye and steps forward to begin her last action as a Hilltop council member.

>-< Carol >-<

It’s interesting how people can be brave when they don’t have to face anyone their choices will impact. Carol makes sure her greetings to the Hilltop council are the sort of cool and polite she reserved for those who looked the other way during her years with Ed. Merle had wanted to come with her, when she selected those of their people to come tonight, but Logan needed a parent, and this? This is the sort of duty she’s not passing off to anyone else. The alliances are her speciality, not Merle’s and not Shane’s.

No one seems to be concerned by the fact that she’s sent people to pack up her children’s households. She’s not entirely sure they understand she’s ordered it done. Jazz is firm that his family will not return to Hilltop if Honey is not welcome.

When Olivia calls the community meeting to order, Carol steps up to stand beside her. Olivia lays a bound and printed copy of Hilltop’s community regulations on a table next to a voting box and a stack of printed slips of paper. The vote is supposed to be anonymous in a situation like this, so every single Hilltop resident will simply circle the option to support or oppose the council’s vote earlier this evening. A radio is set up to make any announcements necessary after today’s vote.

Opening the community book to the appropriate page, Olivia gains everyone’s attention. “A number of people approached a council member to request the exile of a member of the Hilltop community. Our regulations state the person facing exile can call for a community wide vote. They also state that if any member of the council disagrees with the vote, they can also call for that vote. Since the council took their vote with one council member absent and the person being exiled also absent, I am calling for a vote.”

“Where is Jazz?” Kal calls out. “Why did the council vote on an exile issue without him here?”

Carol is impressed that Olivia didn’t need to prompt the young man, but he’s one of Honey’s longtime soldiers. He probably already understands the answer, but he’s helping Olivia’s cause.

“The vote was called by Emmett Carson and Michael Fisher within the hour after Jazz left, despite them admitting to being aware of the petition before he left. It is my opinion that they deliberately excluded one of your elected council members from voting.”

“As he should be, since the person being exiled is a direct family member.”

Olivia smiles cooly at Emmett. “There are provisions to exclude a council member from voting, yet still allow them to be present. It is an act of cowardice to hide a vote from a council member rather than face them.”

Carol is actually a little impressed, her own temper simmering down into something frigid rather than heated the longer she waits and observes. She didn’t expect Olivia to level the accusation so openly, not like she would, or like Jazz did toward Harlan at the Kingdom in the middle of most of the evening meal.

“There was no need to involve him in the vote if he couldn’t cast his.” Emmett’s standing, shoulders squared, and Carol narrows her eyes as she watches the man. It makes so little sense, that one of the Carson brothers would go behind their backs like this. She can understand if Emmett had personal losses, or no close relationship with the Dixons. But the man seemed to be Carol’s friend, baffling her as to what has changed.

“Or maybe you just thought he wouldn’t be too angry to remember he can do exactly what I’m doing?” Olivia turns away from Emmett, facing the gathered crowd. “A petition of two dozen people requested that Hannah Dixon be exiled from Hilltop for failure to fulfill her duties to the community regarding security. Emmett and Michael waited until Jasper left Hilltop to call a vote, and it was settled as three to one to exile Honey from Hilltop.”

Watching the crowd, Carol takes note of who seems angry, both supportive of Honey and not. There’s a decent amount of confusion as well. It seemed the petitioners didn’t seek widespread support within the community.

“Can she be exiled when she isn’t present?” someone calls out. “To speak on her own behalf?”

Olivia nods. “Yes, anyone can be exiled by council while they aren’t present. They have the option to request a vote once they’re informed of their exile.”

The woman looks thoughtful, glancing at a few people gathered around her. “And if we vote at your request, can she still make that request herself later?”

“She can. It gives the community an option to hear other information, since some might change their mind about a vote to exile. If Honey requested her own vote later, after presenting her own case to the people of Hilltop, it could be reversed or upheld, depending on the vote’s outcome.”

“Are we allowed to know who brought the petition to the council?” Kal asks, stepping forward with a cluster of young men and women who serve as Hilltop’s security. “Or is that private?”

“Typically, we would try to keep it private,” Olivia answers. “If the lead petitioner chooses to reveal themselves to make their case prior to a vote, they are welcome to do so.”

Carol has no idea who headed up this idea to eject her daughter from the community she helped build. Olivia obviously knows, but she’s held firmly to the privacy clause, as she should. The younger woman is a better diplomat than most probably expected her to be, especially with years of practice in helping run Hilltop under her belt.

“I have no problem saying that I took the petition to the council.” Earl Sutton steps forward. The man’s still wearing his blacksmith’s apron. If he were anyone else, Carol might suspect that he’s emphasizing his role within the community. Earl’s not that sort of political person, though, so he was simply interrupted in his work. “My son died due to her negligence, yet she survived somehow.”

It takes all the control Carol spent years developing not to speak. It’s not her place - yet. She can see the divisions forming slowly though. Most of the people near Earl and his wife are those who lost someone on the patrol. Grief is something that can turn ugly so quickly that one part of her understands their anger. However, that part of her is not strong enough to dominate the combination of irate mother and pissed off ally that’s brewing behind her calm facade.

Bryce steps forward from the group around the young security team members. Olivia’s husband is taller than many around him, lacking the bulk of someone like Jazz or Merle, but he has presence in a way many don’t after a past as both a Marine and police officer. “Honey had two brothers traveling with her that day. Anyone who knows her knows she wouldn’t risk either Danny or Logan.”

“They’re adopted.” The strained cry comes from Tammy Rose. Motherly grief coats her voice, thickening it with tears. Carol would like to feel empathy for her, because Danny’s death and Logan’s permanent disability make her want to scream curses at the world. But she’s choosing the wrong argument.

When she stands, the woman flinches. Carol knows she looks haggard in a way they’ve never seen, and she takes a deep breath. “Half the children in this community are living with parents who didn’t birth them. Are you saying that those families are somehow less than yours? Do you imply I should grieve for Danny less?”

She steps out further, because this is why she’s here, not as a council member of Homestead, but as the mother who lost as much as anyone here on that Virginia roadside. Tammy Rose backs up a step, but she firms her stance and regains it to face Carol.

“It’s not the same as a child you’ve raised since birth.”

“Oh, it most certainly is.” Carol looks around, seeking those who are Tammy Rose’s supporters. “Every single child of mine would gut me the exact same way losing them. Danny deserved to live a long and happy life. He deserved to see his child born. And the man who took him from us? He will pay.”

“How can he pay if he’s the Kingdom’s ally, and your daughter living among the people who killed Danny and my Kenneth?”

Carol smiles grimly. “The man who led the group that slaughtered our loved ones will be delivered to Hilltop for judgment. He lives, and he’s being watched, and his days are as numbered as those of summer.”

Although she hasn’t had the chance to speak to Honey, Carol knows how her daughter’s mind works. She’s slipped enough information to Jazz and Ezekiel in fits and spurts, right under the nose of the madman she’s undermining. That fact has held strongest, especially since this Derek was the one who personally fired the gun that killed Danny. He’d been aiming for Logan.

“How can you promise that? She’s allied with their leader?” It’s Earl, who seems to be honestly wanting an answer. He’s grieving, but he isn’t wearing it as a heavy cloak like his wife.

“Because it’s the same reason I’m here today to allow the entire community of Hilltop to take a stance on the issue of Honey’s exile. You cannot condemn an entire people for the actions of a few corrupt leaders.”

No one asks what she means by why she’s here. Carol wishes they had, to make the vote better informed, but at least this way it’ll be an honest reflection of everyone’s opinion. Small groups form, conversations Carol cannot hear clearly and doesn’t attempt to as she retakes her seat. Olivia allows it for a while, before calling for everyone’s attention.

“Do we need more time?” It’s starting to get dark, so Carol can understand Olivia wanting to get the vote underway. “The vote can be held tomorrow, to allow everyone time to discuss the issue.”

A suggestion is made to get the vote started, and no one objects, so Olivia motions for Michael Fisher to sit beside her at the table. They each check off Hilltop’s adults, everyone over sixteen, as they tick off boxes on the small slips of paper that will decide Honey’s fate. There’s a selfish part of Carol that hopes this vote will bring Honey and Jazz and their families back home to Homestead. But this isn’t how she ever wanted that to happen.

She doesn’t need the count read aloud by Olivia, who counted the scraps of paper with Emmett, to know that the council’s vote is upheld. It makes her wonder if similar divisions exist within her own community, where people would turn on someone who’s given years of themselves to bettering the community so easily. Olivia’s expression is grim, and the brunette exchanges a look with her husband even as she stands with the final tally in her hands. Bryce disappears.

“Of the one hundred and ninety-two residents eligible to vote, all but seventeen are present tonight,” Olivia reads. Most of those are those sixteen to eighteen apprenticed elsewhere, since Hilltop allows that sixteen is adulthood. A few are working in other communities, like Jazz and Paul would be under normal circumstances on a visit to the Kingdom. “The seventeen absent voters would not influence the vote’s end result. Ninety-two votes are in favor of exiling Hannah Dixon. Eighty-one are against, and two people wrote in to abstain.”

Emmett stands as well now, taking a deep breath. “Hannah Dixon is no longer considered a member of the Hilltop community. The other members of the Alliance will be informed of the decision, as well as her remaining right to one final appeal. They can then make their own decisions as to whether she would be allowed to join their communities.”

It’s political manuevering, this speech, because everyone out there knows there’s no way in hell Homestead would uphold an exile like this. They’ve actually taken in some that were misfits for other communities, sorting out where they best fit, in the same tradition that they took in the few survivors of the prison that Terminus now calls home. In a situation where someone was truly derilect in their duties, they simply wouldn’t be allowed any responsibility at that level in Carol’s home community.

Carol wonders, briefly, if the fact that everyone here knows Honey will always have a place at Homestead influenced their willingness to vote for her exile. It probably does. She knows, from the two exile votes Homestead took, both council only since the person didn’t request a community confirmation with domestic violence as their reason for expulsion, that considering putting someone out on their own in this world is heart wrenching.

Before she can stand, Olivia raises a hand for attention. “I am resigning from the Hilltop council effective immediately, and I have been asked to tender Jasper Dixon’s resignation as well. Both our families will be leaving Hilltop along with Hannah Dixon and Eugene Porter.”

“We didn’t exile Eugene,” someone calls out, sounding a little concerned. Carol thinks they should be, because there are only two fully qualified engineers to service the machinery that Hilltop runs for their own little industrial revolution stage of development. One is Eugene, and the other is Sophia. A few others can tinker, like Honey, or even Earl Sutton. But none can create at their level.

“Did you honestly expect that Eugene would remain somewhere his partner is not?” Carol inquires, taking some small delight in the reality of what they’d just done sinking in. “And while there are those here that think only blood ties count, I doubt Honey’s sister will allow her services to be easily contracted.” Not to mention that Sophia returned to King’s Cross once Honey was located. Between the baby due in July and this vote? It’ll be at least two or three months before Sophia would consider travelling.

When Carol stands and reaches for the radio’s microphone, she swears Emmett flinches. Queuing the mike, she makes the announcement to the Alliance representatives waiting, of both Honey’s exile and the resignation of two of the five Hilltop council members. Acknowledgements come back, one by one. Ezekiel at the Kingdom, Camille at Solomons, Gareth at Terminus, Jorge at King’s Cross, Mary at Turtle Pointe, Patty at Savannah Farm, Johanna at Jekyll, and Beth at Tybee. With Carol here for Homestead and Spencer for Alexandria, their representatives aren’t needed.

Now for the reason she wrote clauses into the Alliances that made Deanna Monroe, with all her time in Congress, cackle softly and say Carol missed her calling. “Homestead formally withdraws from trade and military alliance with Hilltop. All requests for trade or military assistance must go to other allies. Medical requests will continue to be honored. Apprentice agreements will be honored, but no new agreements made going forward.”

Emmett sits down heavily, looking at Michael Fisher with trepidation. Bertie seems aware this was a possibility, but then again, in Carol’s estimate, the school teacher is probably the only one other than Olivia who read the entire Alliance document. The crowd looks concerned, but they’ve made their choices.

The radio alerts. Just as before, acknowledgements come in - but this time, some follow Homestead’s lead. By the time Beth Greene speaks for Tybee a second time, Hilltop has lost direct alliance with every Georgia community except Jekyll Island. That one isn’t surprising, because Johanna and Jack’s small community is about as pacifist as they come, and Honey’s exile is more symbolic than effective.

Honestly, so is the Alliance military issue. Carol knows damn well that if Hilltop was attacked, Homestead would swarm to their defense the same as anyone else, ally or not. It’s the same spirit that has Honey imbedded in the bandit community. This is more of a “make them think about the consequences” moment.

The trade and apprenticeship will hit them harder. Hilltop has a successful agricultural base, in addition to the fledgling manufacturing they’ve been managing. They won’t starve, but they’ll lose a lot of luxuries that only come from further south. It’s luxury, though, as far as food. Apprenticeships being limited to Virginia and Jekyll will get tricky for the same reason. Certain key fields still have their true masters numbered in twos and threes.

It’s temporary, since Carol knows Honey will advocate to restore everything. They’ve lost her though, because Jazz won’t forgive this maneuver, and Honey follows where her brother goes. Maybe that will be Homestead, this time, since Paul’s ties to Hilltop are now cut, but Carol knows it’s equally likely to be the Kingdom because Jazz spent years there before finally moving to Hilltop.

Either way, conversation is starting, angry debates, even as Olivia slips away to pack up her home. For now, the three households worth of belongings will be packed away in Alexandria. Merle’s even negotiated a greenhouse for all of Eugene’s exotic plants. She suspects that Alexandria would love to lure Eugene and Honey both to their community. Only time will tell.

No one seems to notice when she walks away. For now, she’s dealt the blows that will keep Hilltop inwardly focused until she knows more about what Honey’s up to with this Negan. Her daughter is as safe as she can make her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One of the end game issues for ISO is forming a more cohesive system for dealing with law and order issues among the communities... Carol's use of the alliance clauses will set that in motion eventually.


	15. Ours

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Honey confirms her pregnancy and makes a decision with Eugene about whether or not to continue it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Very minor references to abortion in this chapter.

**June 21, 2017**

>-< Honey >-<

Convincing Negan that she needed to see a doctor back at the Kingdom was easier than she expected. The second she mentioned it was gynecology related, the man decided there was no real need for him to accompany her this week, like he had all the times before. Instead, he tells her to take an extra lieutenant, and Gavin and Laura are both happy enough to go. Simon finds fetching food and supplies boring, and Regina tends to stay as far away from Honey as possible.

What she doesn’t expect, when she arrives, is the grim expressions on both her brother and Ezekiel’s faces the second she asks if Harlan’s available after greeting them. She’s getting closer to assurance that while Gavin and Laura might not move against Negan openly, they won’t oppose her planned coup. Taking a risk, she is more open than she might be normally, even as Eugene moves to fiddle with some requested technical bits he’s requested. He’ll get his messages passed covertly enough.

“Something’s wrong,” she says once Jazz finally releases her.

Jazz sighs, looking at the two lieutenants. When she nods reassuringly, he squares his wide shoulders, cluing in her in that her brother is pissed off. All her senses go on alert, because Jazz has the longest fuse of anyone she’s ever met. “Harlan has been indiscrete, as well as vocally opposing the new alliance. Dianne felt he needed some time apart from public life.”

Honey controls her surprise with an effort of will. Of those who might oppose what she was doing, she hadn’t pegged one of her mother’s long time friends to be one who caused Dianne to take security precautions. “I trust that Dianne knows where to draw that line.”

Ezekiel looks strained as he nods. “Perhaps one of the nurses can assist with whatever you need? Or your brother?”

Gavin frowns. He’d been standing there when she managed to run Negan off with discussion of lady problems. “Your brother? I thought he is a veterinarian?”

“I trained with our physician as well. Humans are just one more mammal to memorize,” Jazz says, shrugging. It’s not the first time it’s puzzled someone that he’s equally qualified to handle people, just like Hershel and Beth. Some of the other veterinarians aren’t as cross trained, but it’s a personal preference.

Thinking it over, Honey decides in some ways, she actually prefers Jazz to Harlan anyway. Turning to Gavin and Laura, she makes them an offer. “You can both stay and supervise the supply transfer, or one of you can go with me, if you want a deeper look at what we built here.”

It’s the first time Laura’s been to the Kingdom. In prior trips, Negan had only brought Gavin, seeming content with just his backing. The woman looks at the walls, then the wagons of food and supplies being shifted onto the trucks, before some unspoken agreement passes between her and Gavin. They’re both curious, but for whatever reason, it’s Laura who is going to assuage that curiosity.

“I’d like to have that tour, especially of any sort of medical facilities. We haven’t had anything medical to speak of for close to a year now, other than what hodgepodge medical knowledge Gavin and I cobble together.”

“Do you know how to ride?” Honey asks, looking at the riding horses that Ezekiel, Jazz, Jerry, and a handful of guards rode. She’s seeing faces here that aren’t Kingdom, and it makes her uneasy. Kal just gives her a bland smile, shifting a little in a uniform he’s not used to.

Laura shakes her head. “No. Are all of the horses here giant sized ones?”

Considering the draft crossbreeds that dominate the breeding they’ve done, Honey understands the woman’s trepidation. She grew up around Percheron crosses, and they’re still huge even to her perceptions. “We breed for strength and endurance, not speed,” she tells Laura. “You can ride with me.”

Ezekiel indicates he’ll stay, actually beginning a conversation with Gavin about the struts reinforcing the wall from within while the Savior soldiers under their command help load trucks. They know they’ll be fed before they leave, so going to retrieve supplies is a popular duty among the men and women assigned to Gavin and Honey. Content that Ezekiel will continue to help her lay groundwork, Honey takes the reins of Ezekiel’s favorite mare when Jerry brings her up.

“Eugene? Are you staying, or would you like to ride along?” Honey calls out. She’s made it this far by staunchly refusing to think about the consequences of what that pregnancy test means for either of them. Negan had been in an odd mood last night, leaving abruptly after eating supper with her, so she had spent the night curled into Eugene’s arms.

To her infinite relief, Eugene trots over, taking the reins of a horse. It reminds her of how he was once intimidated by the big animals, but now, they’re just one of the cogs of daily life. Jazz is astride his own horse, waiting patiently as Honey swings into the saddle and offers Laura a hand up. “We’ll be back within the hour,” Honey tells Gavin before urging the horse toward the parts of the Kingdom not easily seen from the gate.

The design is purposeful, as with most defense at any of the communities. The military minded members other than her father might not be builders or engineers, but they’ve been able to help Honey think along those lines in a way she never would have in the old world. Honey knows what Laura’s seeing, especially when they pass through another set of gates - and pass within the secondary walls.

“Jesus,” the woman mutters into Honey’s ear. “It’s like one of those old shows about castles, isn’t it?”

“More or less. Just without a castle at the end.” Although honestly, if she could figure out how to build something that unassailable at any of the communities, Honey would. Walkers and unwanted wildlife are easy to keep out with just the double ring of walls everyone that isn’t on an island has. But bandits? Those are infinitely more troublesome.

“This is what you’re planning for the Sanctuary, isn’t it?” The blonde is wide eyed, taking in the clean, healthy residents going about their day as they reach the settled areas. The area between the inner and outer walls is all cropland, with occasional pasturage. Here? The remains of the old boarding school are still visible, but beyond the old world construction are the cabins, cottages, and livestock structures built since the Outbreak.

Children ride bicycles by, careful to avoid spooking the horses. A few call out greetings to the riders, and Honey greets them warmly. It keeps her mind off where she’s headed, and the additional worry of just what the hell has happened to have Harlan residing in the tiny jail that was built to handle the occasional misconduct that merited more than hard labor. The man’s practically Ezekiel’s brother, much like Jerry.

They reach the building that houses the school’s small infirmary, which has been upgraded to a mini-hospital instead of a school clinic. Honey helps Laura to dismount, following suit. “If you would like a broader tour, I can ask someone,” she offers. Laura really doesn’t need to be here for the ultrasound, even though Honey’s figuring today’s trip can’t stay secret for long, no matter what she decides. 

She watches Laura look around, but when the woman’s gaze returns to Honey, there’s the barest flicker of a look towards Honey’s midsection. Somehow, the lieutenant knows, although commentary about the gynecologist probably gave it all away to another woman. “I wouldn’t mind a tour, actually,” she says at last. “Maybe your brother’s husband could show me around.”

Honey doesn’t breathe a sigh of relief, even though she wants to, because Laura is giving her leeway to decide without Laura officially knowing what happens here today. A tour of the community is well within normal behavior for how Laura and Gavin both worked with the communities they were in charge of back in New York. Neither approved of Simon’s reign of terror over his own assignments.

When Jazz radios for Jesus, the other man appears so quickly that Honey is fairly sure he was lurking nearby. Laura finds his boyish charm amusing, at least, and allows herself to be led away. Jesus’s ability to seemingly tell all without telling anything will be put to the test.

“Hannah?” Jazz’s voice draws her attention back from watching the pair go, and the weight settles on her chest again. “Why did you need to see Harlan?”

He knows, Honey thinks, just like Laura does, but he looks worried and afraid. She loathes that expression on her brother’s face. Eugene’s warm hands on her shoulders help her finally voice the words. “I need to confirm a pregnancy by ultrasound.”

“Okay.” Jazz moves as soon as he voices the word, going to the machine in question and switching it on. “You know the procedure,” he says huskily.

Yes, she does, but the last time she was in the same room with Jazz and that piece of equipment, they were happy, not terrified. But she has to know, so she sheds her belt and its holstered equipment and hoists herself onto the exam table to adjust her waistband. Eugene takes her hand as easily as he always has, and it’s him she focuses on. 

Not the cool gel. Not the wand against her skin. Not her brother’s intake of breath that is all the answer she needs.

Eugene is the one to eventually look. He tilts his head, studying the screen. “Not ectopic, thank God.” His relieved expression eases to a smile as he looks back at her.

“What do you want to do?” Jazz asks softly, and when she finally looks away from Eugene at her brother, he’s let go of whatever had him so angry. All she sees is her Jasper, all solemn crystal clear blue eyes that always seem to read her mind. “What do you want me to do?”

If she asks him, there will be no need to consider the pregnancy at all. He’ll fix this for her, because he’s her brother and that’s what he’ll always do for her. Swallowing hard, she closes her eyes. “How far along am I?”

“Five weeks, plus or minus five days.”

Honey does the math. It’s not a definitive answer on paternity, not by a long shot. She was taken six days before she actually slept with Negan. Having a physician sister, midwife mother, and veterinarian brother means she’s aware of conception variables more than the average non-medical person. All the ultrasound confirms is that she conceived before Eugene joined the Saviors with her.

“I don’t know.” It should be an easy answer, ending the pregnancy, because Eugene doesn’t want biological children, and the other option here is a man who lost his humanity years ago, if he ever had it at all. While she doesn’t see Eugene’s autism as the problem he still does, she understands. He had thirty years of being discarded and undervalued because he was different. Even nearly seven years with her family - with Jazz as his family - hasn’t undone all that damage.

Eugene squeezes her hand, and when she looks at him, he just smiles sadly. “I would never ask you to…” He clears his throat, letting her register the significance. Asking her not to purposely conceive is different than an accident. “I can see the heartbeat,” he says softly, the same sense of awe in his voice that he had when she was carrying MJ.

She cries then, because paternity doesn’t matter anymore, not really, but she isn’t ready for what keeping this baby will bring to them both.

>-< Eugene >-<

Eugene realizes the second Honey starts crying that he shouldn’t have mentioned the little flutter on the screen. She hasn’t looked at the screen at all, and he knows the psychology of that. Even after years of effort, his filter still slips, and this was definitely a bad time for it.

Exchanging a worried look with Jazz, he eases onto the bed, glad it’s not an exam table. Jazz wipes the gel away, laying the wand aside for now. Once he can tuck Honey onto his chest, it doesn’t surprise him that Jazz leaves them alone. Running his hand along her back, he waits for her to finally raise her head from his chest. She sits up and wraps her arms around her bent knees, and he sits up, moving so that he’s facing her. Blue eyes glitter with tears, but she blinks them away, searching his expression for any type of discomfort. “Negan is a monster, Eugene. What kind of legacy is that for a child?”

He cups her face in his hands. “Will Dixon was a monster, too. Your father isn’t. Daryl isn’t. There is no scenario in the world where I can imagine a child raised by you, by us, with your family all around, would ever be anything like Negan.”

“Nurture versus nature,” she mumbles.

“And your father and uncle aren’t the only examples. Sophia. Ron and Sam. Hershel.” He takes a deep breath, because years of distance doesn’t make the knowledge easier. “Me.”

Taking a deep breath, she turns her head and kisses his palm. “I love you.”

“I love you, too. If you want the baby, we’ll figure the rest out.” For him, it’s as easy as that. He promised her years ago that any child of hers was a child of his. Paternity be damned in this case until she feels like talking.

It doesn’t take long. Honey’s always had a particular gift for sorting through even strong emotions quickly, something she gets from her father.

“Eugene? I can’t.” 

It’s such a subdued statement that he barely recognizes her voice. “Which can’t, sweetheart?” Because that’s the important part. What she decides, he’s at her side, like he promised years ago when she saw something in him that no woman ever did before.

“What if it’s ours?” she asks softly. “Ours.”

One thing Eugene’s never been accused of is being stupid. He knows Honey respects his wish not to have biological children. But what he still sees on his worst days as the affliction he was raised to think his autism is, she’s never seen it as such. It’s an impossible thing for her to believe, because to consider it that way would change how she sees her brother. But he’s always known accidents can happen, no matter what birth control is used, and that’s something he can live with.

“It’s ours either way, Hannah Catherine. If you keep the baby, it’s ours.” With any other man, he wouldn’t see an issue with co-parenting any child Honey has. A failure of birth control has always been a possibility, one he had no problem accepting. But this failure? Negan is not an acceptable option for being anyone’s father.

>-< Honey >-<

When Honey pictured having a child of her own, she’d always thought the child would look much like MJ. Paul is her best friend. There’s never been a question in her mind that she’d ask him one day.

It had been foolish to assume the damn IUD would last. None of them were ever tested for this sort of shelf life, and the hormonal ones were the most risky in that. Any other scenario and there wouldn’t have been a question of continuing the pregnancy. Here in the sunlit infirmary of the Kingdom, she looks at the complete sincerity on Eugene’s face and absorbs his words.

“Ours.” 

A single word that she repeats, and he smiles that brilliant smile of his that intrigued her long before she ever thought he would return her interest. It sustains her through Jazz returning, finishing the ultrasound he began.

“IUD’s nowhere to be found,” he says, skimming the screen. “Should show up here,” he points to the screen, “or even shifted a bit lower, but it would show. I’ll confirm with an x-ray. It could have dislodged at any point since your last exam four months ago.”

“At least it means it’s not going to cause any problems,” she tells Jazz. “That’s what was so urgent.”

Her brother’s hands shake a little when he faces her. “This is getting too dangerous, Hannah. It wasn’t safe before, but now? We have no idea how a man like that will react.”

Taking his hands, Honey gives him her most reassuring smile. “No, we don’t, but I’m getting close enough to tip it now. It’s not like I intend to let him stick around long enough to know.”

“I wish you had more backup.” Jazz glances to Eugene, expression apologetic. “Not that I doubt your abilities. You just can’t be everywhere.”

Honey understands, and Eugene just nods. Eugene’s precise role at the Sanctuary keeps him from playing bodyguard, but neither of them want anyone else at risk. “I won’t endanger anyone else. That’s non-negotiable, baby brother.”

Eugene has a shield of sorts, because his sort of usefulness is nearly impossible to replace these days. Honey’s rank and Negan’s ongoing fascination protects her. But anyone who is just there as a fighter, a soldier? Negan wouldn’t hesitate a moment to use them against her if he thought she needed to be taught a lesson.

Her own issues handled, she remembers all the oddities surrounding Harlan Carson and seeing too many Hilltoppers here in the Kingdom for her comfort. “What’s going on with Harlan? The version you can tell without outsiders around, please.”

Being hauled into her brother’s arms for a bear hug is not unexpected. But he presses a kiss to her forehead before smiling sadly as he releases her. “Some people don’t know the true meaning of loyalty or gratitude, Hannah.” Hesitating, he seems to be mulling over how much to say. “Mama’s got it well in hand. Leave it to us for now. Concentrate on saving people and stay safe doing it.”

“Do my job and let you do yours?” 

It makes Jazz smile, at least. Honey wants to know all the details, but the careful omissions her brother is making has the feel of orders from higher up the chain than Jazz. It has the feel of Scout or Carol’s involvement, so she decides to trust in what he’s told her. She has her job and he has his.

The sooner hers is done, the safer everyone she loves is.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Since I know there will probably be some requests of "don't make the baby Negan's", alas, it's a key part of the whole arc of the story that the baby is Negan's child. In irony, my strongly voiced objections to Rick stealing Judith from Shane are well known to anyone reading my stories - yet here goes an exception to that rule in allowing characters to take that route regarding paternity.
> 
> Eugene's statement about nurture vs nature is something I feel strongly about in children overcoming legacies of parents not fit to be parents (even if just genetic contributors).


	16. Shit to Think About

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Negan learns that the Kingdom isn't the weak farming community he assumed it was, but Honey provides an unintended distraction.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Any Negan chapter should be a warning unto itself, and his POV is the dominant one.

** June 21, 2017 **

>-< Negan >-<

Negan sprawls in a chair on the balcony to his own private room. The supply runners returned two hours ago, with everything promised as the Kingdom always delivers. In perhaps the ultimate test, both Honey and her pet also returned, and they’ve got extra equipment that makes more sense to them and Fat Joey than anyone else. The quasi-engineer is like a damned puppy following the other two around.

“They might make a real engineer out of him yet.”

He rolls his head enough to lay eyeballs on Laura. She’s leaning against the wall, that quiet patience of hers as cool as ice like always. “It’s about fucking time. He sure as hell spends enough time dogging at their heels.”

Not that he can really bitch about it, because making already useful people extra useful is one less damned headache for him to deal with. Eying where the trio now has the welding machine broken out for their project, he drops his feet from the patio table and rotates to level his stare on Laura. “How did the visit go today? Anything alarming come up?”

“I got a tour inside the walls.”

“No shit. How far in?”

“All the way to the center. Went with Honey and her brother as far as their infirmary, then took up the brother-in-law’s offer to have a look around. That little shit talks more than Eugene.” Laura sounds half impressed, half frustrated. 

“What’s the fucking place actually like? All pigs and sheep and crops?” Considering how much fresh produce they hand over like it’s nothing, not to mention the freshly slaughtered mutton and pork.

Laura shakes her head, looking thoughtful. “It’s interesting, comparing here and there. She’s laying the foundations, so now I see more of what her vision will be.” She walks forward, watching as Honey calls one of the hovering drudge kids over and drops a welding shield over the kid’s head. “It’s a fortress, like something out of those old books they’d shove in front of me as a kid about the middle ages.”

Negan thinks over those fucking massive reinforced walls he’s seen, concrete and metal, meant to last like little else will. “You abso-fucking-lutely sure of that?”

“Absolutely. If she hadn’t allied with us…” Laura swallows hard, and she looks afraid in a way he’s never quite inspired. “They aren’t soft people like up north. I suspect they could have slaughtered us all before we even knew they were out there. Derek’s group got lucky because Honey tried to negotiate first. He doesn’t even realize he’s a dead man walking.”

“And why is that?” Negan isn’t fucking stupid. He’s seen the ice cold looks Honey levels at the barely competent fuckwit who will never amount to more than what he is, fit to lead scouting parties but nothing larger. Although he knows Derek didn’t offer parlay to Honey’s team, he’s been letting the little shitstain sweat.

“One of the men killed when she was taken was her brother, an older one according to what I overheard. Man was a Marine. Probably explains what Gavin sees in her fighting style.”

“Interesting.” It probably is a miracle the damned man is still alive, but being one of Simon’s underlings is probably making Honey take her time. Negan doubts that it’ll protect the bastard in the long run. He could probably hurry it along, and enjoy the fucking show. She’s never taken down a living man in front of him before.

It’s a thought that arouses him like few others. He shifts in his chair, looking back to the welding crew. They seem to be assembling a mobile version of one of Fat Joey’s trick bombs. “Ah hell. What the fuck are they planning on blowing up?”

Laura shrugs, shifting away from the wall at last. “Nothing yet. They were debating the potential for a mobile bomb on the way back. Sort of the reverse of a bomb diffusing robot, I think. You’d have to ask them the specifics.”

Negan just laughs his ass off. “Nah. Last time I fucking did that, Eugene didn’t stop explaining the physics of his project for ten goddamned minutes.” He could have shut the asshole up, but Honey had her pondering face on, and it ended up spawning an idea on how to secure the bridge spanning the river without sacrificing structural integrity.

The Sanctuary is going to be a fortress in its own right. Negan thinks he’s looking forward to it for fucking once, having solid plans for the future beyond finding the next set of idiot farmers to serve his soldiers. “They got a decent infirmary there?” he asks, changing the subject. 

“Yeah. All the bells and whistles still useful now. Had its own generator.” Laura seems to mull something over. “Something went down there, between this week and last. The King’s security threw their doctor in holdup for disagreeing with the alliance.”

“So who the hell did she see for whatever medical shit had her all squirrelly?” he demands, voice a growl. At least the self-styled king is taking decisive action, but the idea of the objection fucking rankles.

“Her brother is crosstrained as a physician.”

Seeing her brother for a health concern she distinctly stated needed gynecological attention is almost creepier than her telling him she birthed her own nephew. Family is goddamned twisted, but as long as it’s fucking resolved, he guesses it doesn’t matter how. “Maybe we should expand the alliance to have the brother here, too.”

It would give him more control over Honey staying, if she’s got family here, and the little pet doesn’t count, no matter how fond she is of him. Kidnapping the man probably won’t work, because he’s a goddamn fucking mountain in human form. Maybe he’ll freak everyone the fuck out and just ask the man politely and see if that family devotion runs both ways.

“His husband could be useful. Runs supply teams, from what I can tell.”

“What’s the catch? Their fucking mini-me?” It’s not like there aren’t kids among the drudges. None of the female soldiers seem to want to spawn any little bastards, but the drudges breed like fucking rabbits. Hell, the damn toddler is probably his best bet on getting the parents to follow his lead. It can’t be too bad, being almost big enough to stop pissing and shitting itself based on what’s Honey’s said.

Laura shakes her head. “We aren’t exactly the sort of place that would welcome a pair of men married to each other.”

“That is a goddamn wrinkle to be ironed out, ain’t it?” Negan stands, bored with staying still for the moment. Inaction doesn’t suit him, or he would sit his ass in the Sanctuary while his lieutenants did all the work. He’ll decide later if the idea of a doctor closely related to Honey living her is worth the heads he’ll have to bash together to set new rules in place.

One way or another, Honey stays with him.

Four hours later, the proverbial penny finally drops when he realizes that the woman who normally matches him drink for fucking drink no matter what the hard liquor is hasn’t touched a single damned drop at supper. “Holy shit,” he breathes, eyes locking on hers. “Holy fucking shit.”

Years of bankrupting themselves for treatments, only for miscarriage after goddamn miscarriage until finally cancer put an end to one hell and started another for Lucille. After the dead started walking, he’s sowed his oats with anyone willing and had three wives under thirty. Not a damn one has shown a sign of anything taking root made him figure fate just loves fucking him over like it’s a competitive sport. He fucked around on Lucille when she was at her lowest, and fate was just gonna keep reaming him eternally for that.

A slight shuffle of movement from the couch where Eugene’s been unusually quiet tonight reminds him the man’s been working little and watching Honey a lot. The son of a bitch knows already, Negan thinks, and he remembers that he’s abandoned her bed more than once, and it did not go unoccupied.

“Mine or his?” he asks, ignoring the possibility that he’s never even asked if she left other lovers behind. Her lack of mooning around in distress indicated she hadn’t. Her pet is the important one, because she keeps him close.

The other man actually makes a sound of distress, shaking his head vigorously. “Not mine. Never mine.” He hugs himself, rubbing at his elbows.

“What the fuck is wrong with him?” Negan demands, turning his attention back to Honey.

“Eugene thinks his condition is genetic,” Honey states calmly. “He requested to be sterilized rather than risk passing it on.”

“Huh. Not something that would have been able to fly with all the fucked up medical ethics of the old world. You let the veterinarian neuter you? Give you the old snip?” Insulting Eugene is easier than facing Honey at the moment, the words flowing automatically, especially when the other man gives him the satisfaction of hiding his face in his hands and sobbing. “Maybe I should have had you inspected instead of assuming fucking is why you crawl into bed with her all the time.”

“Leave him alone.”

The steel in Honey’s voice sends icy chills down his spine, but he stiffens rather than give in to them. He turns back to her, hazel eyes locking on pale blue. “Or what?”

There’s an echo of that moment in the cell, when he pressed the bat against her bruised skin and wondered who would win if he swung the bat at her. It isn’t just the potential for the darkened abyss he’s looking at right now; it’s the abyss itself. She doesn’t need to reply, because he knows the answer the same as he knows what’s coming when he raises his bat to make some cowardly group bow to his will.

The only difference is he might die faster than his targets do.

It should piss him off, the open threat that she would kill him over someone who can barely be called a man, if that. Instead, it turns him on like he’s been hit with a fucking freight train of arousal. He can tell the moment it registers with her, because she finishes the draw on the karambit, running her finger along the back of the blade. “He’s mine.”

“And what am I?”

“The man who is going to make this place safe for our child.”

“How the hell do you know I even want to claim the spawn? It’s just a fucking bite-sized snack for the dead.”

Honey gives him a sly smile, still playing with that damned knife. “Because you wouldn’t have asked about the paternity if you didn’t want it.”

Shoving his chair back, Negan gets to his feet. Reaching over to steal her tumbler, he downs the vodka and drops the glass onto the table. It breaks, but Honey never takes her eyes off his until he looks away first. Gathering up Lucille, he stalks away from the absolute fucking wrongness of any woman other than his wife, the real one, carrying his child.

>-< Honey >-<

As soon as the door slams shut, Honey’s on her feet. Amber peeks timidly out of her room, and Honey waves her back inside. “It’s okay. How’s your mother doing?”

“Better, now that she has those new meds you brought her.” Surprisingly, the other woman steps out into the living area. She’s older than Honey by a couple of years, but you wouldn’t know it by most of her behaviors. Then again, she’s been one of Negan’s wives since she was barely out of her teens. It arrested any maturity she might have attained, and every protective sense Honey has flares to identify her as ‘girl’ and not ‘woman’. “Are you really pregnant?”

“I am.” A glance toward Eugene shows he’s dried his face. He’s watching Amber with the sort of calm calculation that disturbs people who don’t know him. Since he’s fine, she concentrates on the girl instead.

“It’s really Negan’s? Not Eugene’s?” Amber looks horrified by the idea.

“It really is.” Honey reaches out to run a soothing hand down Amber’s arm. Since she took Amber and her mother under her protection, it’s set uneasily with the girl that Honey’s taken her place in Negan’s bed, to her view of it. There’s no point in explaining the margin of error for the ultrasound in light of the gamble she’s making with Negan.

“How can you stand it?” Wide eyes focus on Honey’s midsection. “He’s a monster. I prayed every month. Used those fertility calendars when the birth control got too old to be trusted.”

For all Negan’s purported high sex drive, Honey knows he stringently avoided those risky weeks. She’s seen the wives’ quarters. It’s a creepy reverse version of what she used herself when MJ was conceived. Weirdly enough, Negan’s never even questioned her on the subject, so she just assumed it was the women’s doing and his warped sense of consent played along.

“What’s wrong with him has nothing to do with the baby. My own grandfather was a murderous bastard who beat my grandmother to death with his own fists, but my father? You couldn’t ask for a better man on this planet. We make our own destiny, remember?”

Amber searches her expression before nodding. The girl’s never asked Honey what her actual intent is here, probably aiming for plausible deniability, but Honey thinks she suspects something. She startles Honey by hugging her, an embrace Honey returns willingly. “Mama’s good at knitting. She’ll love having a baby to make little outfits for.”

As soon as Amber is back in her room with her mother, Honey turns back to Eugene, crossing the room to sit with him on the couch. “I envy you,” she says softly, reaching up to wipe away moisture he missed in scrubbing his face on his shirt sleeve.

“How so?” he asks, leaning into the touch like he always does.

“I can never cry when I’m scared.”

Eugene chuckles, covering her hand with his before kissing her palm. “No, you funnel it into fixing whatever makes you terrified. Are you absolutely certain this is the appropriate angle to play with this man? He does not strike me as the protective and paternal type.”

“Call it an instinct. Everything about him says he wants to bind me to him irreversibly. Maybe he’s not paternal, but he’s possessive. What says permanent more than a child?”

“And removing all doubt makes certain of that. You’re lucky he thinks so poorly of me that his mind easily accepts that I would have myself physically altered in a way a man like him would consider neutering.”

“Underlay the lie with the truth,” Honey says softly. Maybe she talked Eugene out of the risk of the surgery, but he had wanted it done. “Just like Scout taught me.”

“The added benefit of potentially keeping me off the psychopath’s radar seems to be one of your incentives, darlin’.”

Honey just laughs and lets the last vestiges of the fear go when she realized she miscalculated and gave away the pregnancy before she could fully analyze what Negan’s reaction might be. “Keeping you alive is always one of my top incentives.”

When he kisses her, she considers amping up the heat and taking him to bed, but Negan’s too revved up tonight. A return isn’t out of the question, so instead, she simply takes him to bed, curling into his warmth like a giant teddy bear and breathing in the native scent of him that always tells her she’s home.

>-< Eugene >-<

Eugene isn’t surprised that Honey falls asleep quickly. It’s a particular skill of hers, honed by coming to adulthood in a world turned more warzone than anything she ever expected to see. Like any good soldier, she sleeps when and where she can. At least with him here, it’s a restful sleep. He’s still her Q, but after seven years, he’s skilled enough to protect her, too.

When he hears the outer door open, and dull, careful steps coming toward the bedroom, he slides his hand under the pillow to retrieve Honey’s Glock from between the mattress and the headboard. Moving it to an angle that keeps it hidden under the bed sheet is easy enough. No one else would enter their quarters after dark, not even Simon, so he knows who the intruder is. Honey doesn’t stir, a combination of the day’s emotional upheaval and the absolute exhaustion early pregnancy always puts her through.

The barb wire bat doesn’t make a sound as Negan gently lays it across the top of the dresser. Eugene has never seen Negan drunk, no matter how much the man’s imbibed, but something about his movements when he grips the footboard tells him the man’s probably so far gone it’s a miracle he’s upright. He looks haunted in a way Eugene didn’t think the man was capable of being.

“Why did she keep it?”

That’s not the question he expects from the man. “What?”

“I’m not a moron. World may be gone to complete hell, but women ended pregnancies without all the fucking fancy technology that fell by the wayside.” Negan’s eyes glitter in the moonlit room. “And for all the stupid ass renaissance fair playacting, her people still have that tech, don’t they?”

“They do,” Eugene acknowledges. Letting Laura have the tour was a deliberate risk, tipping their hand a little, because sustaining the medieval farm community image forever is unlikely. The military vehicles captured when Honey was and the convoy Eugene himself had been taken from gave away too much.

“So why would she keep it?” Negan repeats. “She doesn’t want children.”

It’s funny how too many see Honey’s lack of rush into her own motherhood as a lack of wanting to be a mother at all. Even this man is susceptible to it. He opts for the truth to cushion the lie, just like Honey did. “There is a difference between avoiding motherhood and actively ending it.”

“Huh.” Negan’s fists twist against the rail at the foot of the bed. He’s staring at Honey, who is tucked into Eugene’s left shoulder like it’s a pillow. “It’s mine, and she kept it anyway.”

“She did.” Honey envies him his ability to shed fear and stress into crying. He prays for her ability to feed it into anger, just this once, anything to keep him calm.

“I don’t fucking understand anything about how her goddamn mind works.”

Eugene thinks of the manic speeches he’s heard Negan give about building the future. “She asked me what point is securing the world if there’s no one to inherit it.”

“An heir. Fucking hell. She was goddamn serious.”

“I have never known her to be anything but serious on such a subject as this one.”

“And what is your fucking place in this world she foresees?” Drunk or not, Eugene gets the bone chilling feeling that the days of Negan ignoring him out of some misguided idea that he’s defective may be over.

“Making sure that she and anyone she chooses doesn’t just survive, but thrives.”

“And if that includes me?”

Eugene risks a smile, a true one, because for whatever time the man has left before Honey sends him to his fate, it actually does. “Haven’t you already figured out that it does?”

Negan stares at him for a long moment before he eases away from the bed, making his way to the couch and slumping down onto it. “Get some sleep, Eugene. I got shit to think about tonight, and you got a fucking concrete pouring system to finish rigging in the morning.”

Nodding, Eugene slips the Glock back into its spot, rolling so that his back is to Negan, and Honey more comfortable against his chest. Either their gamble will pay off or it won’t, and tonight at least, he doesn’t think the man will make a move that endangers Honey. Like he said, Negan’s got shit to think about.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know some readers are missing the rest of the Dixons, but they will turn up once the coup happens and the primary action moves back to Georgia.
> 
> Next chapter will be more Negan, with the apex of the coup storyline in 2-3 chapters.


End file.
